<!DOCTYPE html>
<html>
<head>
<meta charset="UTF-8">
<title>Let the Wrong One In by Cynder2013</title>
<style type="text/css">

body { background-color: #ffffff; }
.CI {
text-align:center;
margin-top:0px;
margin-bottom:0px;
padding:0px;
}
.center   {text-align: center;}
.cover    {text-align: center;}
.full     {width: 100%; }
.quarter  {width: 25%; }
.smcap    {font-variant: small-caps;}
.u        {text-decoration: underline;}
.bold     {font-weight: bold;}
</style>
</head>
<body>
<h1><a href="https://archiveofourown.org/works/24028924">Let the Wrong One In</a> by <a class='authorlink' href='https://archiveofourown.org/users/Cynder2013/pseuds/Cynder2013'>Cynder2013</a></h1>

<table class="full">

<tr><td><b>Series:</b></td><td>O+ Mixtape [1]</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Category:</b></td><td>Buffy the Vampire Slayer (TV)</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Genre:</b></td><td>Abusive Relationships, Aftermath of Torture, Alcohol, Alternate Universe - Canon Divergence, Blood Drinking, Blood and Injury, Cancer treatment, Canon-Typical Violence, Cross-Posted on FanFiction.Net, F/F, F/M, Gun Violence, Hospitals, Implied/Referenced Homophobia, Implied/Referenced Racism, Implied/Referenced Suicide, Implied/Referenced Torture, Implied/Referenced Underage Sex, M/M, Mentions of Cancer, Mild Language, Multi, Needles, Non-Consensual Touching, Underage Drinking</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Language:</b></td><td>English</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Status:</b></td><td>Completed</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Published:</b></td><td>2020-05-05</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Updated:</b></td><td>2020-07-31</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Packaged:</b></td><td>2021-05-03 01:41:10</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Rating:</b></td><td>Mature</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Warnings:</b></td><td>Graphic Depictions Of Violence, Major Character Death</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Chapters:</b></td><td>28</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Words:</b></td><td>99,541</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Publisher:</b></td><td>archiveofourown.org</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Story URL:</b></td><td>https://archiveofourown.org/works/24028924</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Author URL:</b></td><td>https://archiveofourown.org/users/Cynder2013/pseuds/Cynder2013</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Summary:</b></td><td><div class="userstuff">
              <p>After her mom passes away, Lucy Moore moves in with her aunt and cousin. Unfortunately, her cousin happens to be Buffy Summers, and Lucy finds herself stuck between her cousin the Slayer and the big, bad vampires who are way too interested in using her as a human juice box. Welcome to Sunnydale.</p>
            </div></td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Relationships:</b></td><td>Angel/Buffy Summers, Cordelia Chase/Xander Harris, Daniel "Oz" Osbourne/Willow Rosenberg, Drusilla/Spike (BtVS), Drusilla/Spike (BtVS)/Lucy Moore (BtVS OC), Jenny Calendar/Rupert Giles, Spike (BtVS)/Lucy Moore (BtVS OC), Spike (BtVS)/Original Female Character(s)</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Series:</b></td><td>O+ Mixtape [1]</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Series URL:</b></td><td>https://archiveofourown.org/series/1733377</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Comments:</b></td><td>19</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Kudos:</b></td><td>55</td></tr>

</table>

<a name="section0001"><h2>1. Californian Human Girl</h2></a>
<div class="story"><div class="userstuff module">
    
    <p>
  <strong> <em>Buffy</em> </strong>
</p>
<p>Buffy eased open the front door. She was pretty sure that her mom wouldn’t be waiting up for her since it was just a school dance so she thought that she would have the rest of the night to brainstorm reasons for Ampata to never be seen in Sunnydale by anyone ever again. She didn’t expect to be attacked by a hug the minute she stepped into the kitchen.</p>
<p>“Mom?” she asked.</p>
<p>Mom replied with a strangled sob. Buffy patted her back awkwardly until her mom was able to speak.</p>
<p>“Your Aunt Lolly died last week,” Mom said slowly.</p>
<p>Buffy blinked. “What? Last week?”</p>
<p>Mom nodded. Another tear ran down her cheek. “Last week,” she repeated. “My baby sister died last week and no one told us.”</p>
<p>Buffy prepared herself for another hug, but her mom took a deep breath and dried her tears with her sleeve. She was taking this better than Buffy would have expected. Buffy wondered how long she had been crying for before she got home.</p>
<p>“Are we going to the funeral?” Buffy asked carefully.</p>
<p>It turned out that the funeral had already happened. Buffy wasn’t disappointed. She had already been to more than enough funerals for someone her age, and if Aunt Lolly had turned into a vampire she wasn’t sure if she would be able to stake her. Aunt Lolly and her daughter had come down from San Francisco every year to visit them for Thanksgiving when they lived in LA. Mom and Aunt Arlene were the only members of their family who kept in contact with Lolly and the three of them were very close. If Buffy had to kill a demon that had taken over her aunt’s body she wasn’t sure that she would be able to look her mom in the eyes again. She was better off not knowing.</p>
<p>“Lucy will be coming to live with us,” Mom said. “I just got a call from her caseworker. They’re coming on Friday.”</p>
<p>“Guess we don’t have to move the extra bed out of my room,” Buffy said with a tight smile. There wasn’t anywhere else for Lucy to sleep unless they cleared out the third bedroom, which was currently serving as a storage room and Mom’s office. That was a project that would probably take more than a month to finish. There was a lot of stuff in there and it wasn’t like it could just magically disappear.</p>
<p>Well, it could, but Mom would ask questions.</p>
<p>“Not yet,” Mom agreed. “As long as you don’t mind sharing a little longer...Where is Ampata?”</p>
<p>“Oh, she got a phone call,” Buffy said slowly. “Her dad is really sick and she had to go home tonight. I told her we’d send her stuff tomorrow.”</p>
<p>“That’s a shame. I’ll make sure everything gets shipped.” Mom gave Buffy another hug. “Now, you go to bed. You’ve got school tomorrow.”</p>
<p>As soon as Buffy got to her bedroom she inched around the real Ampata’s luggage and picked up the phone on her bedside table, dialing quickly. “Hi, Willow?”</p>
<p>Willow answered almost immediately. “Yeah, what’s up? Did the body in the truck come to life?”</p>
<p>Buffy’s eyes widened and she looked at the closed trunk that held the real Ampata’s mummified corpse. Well, she wasn’t getting any sleep tonight.</p>
<p>“No. I hope not.” Buffy shook her head. “I need you to check if someone is human for me.”</p>
<p>Without even pausing Willow asked, “Who?”</p>
<p>“My cousin Lucy. Her mom’s name is Eloise, we called her Lolly. She died last week. They lived in San Francisco.” Buffy could hear Willow scribbling down the information.</p>
<p>“Dad?” Willow asked.</p>
<p>“I don’t remember his name but he was a teacher and I think he was shot.” Buffy had a vague memory of a funeral that came right after her mom and dad sat down with her four-year-old preschool self for a “guns bad” discussion. “Maybe. And I don’t know her last name.”</p>
<p>Willow sighed. “I’ll see what I can find. See you tomorrow.”</p>
<p>“Bye.” Buffy hung up the phone and looked at the trunk again. Yeah, she had to do something about <em>that.</em></p>
<p>She and Willow met in the library after school to go over what Willow had found. The first thing that Willow said was that she was pretty sure Lucy was human.</p>
<p>“I found these hospital records. See? She and her mom are checking in and out a lot last year, and then last month her mom checks in and doesn’t check out. I think that’s when she died.” Willow smiled and then grimaced. “Not that that’s of the good, but it checks out. And look! Daytime, so no vampires. I couldn’t find what they were going in for though.”</p>
<p>“That’s okay, Will.” Buffy leaned on the back of Willow’s chair and looked at the computer screen. “Did you find anything else?”</p>
<p>“Uh...” Willow poked at the keyboard for a few moments. “Her dad’s death certificate got digitized. John Moore, gunshot wound, like you thought, with a little heroy annotation. And school stuff. Lucy missed a lot of school last year but her grades aren’t bad and she’s in senior year now. No weird disappearances or unexplained deaths that I can see.”</p>
<p>In short, no Slayer problems.</p>
<p>Buffy nodded. “So, normal?”</p>
<p>“Normal,” Willow agreed. “Is it bad that I’m not sure if that’s a good thing or not?”</p>
<p>“I’m not sure either,” Buffy said, “but as long as Xander doesn’t fall in love with her we should be fine.”</p>
<p>And gods help her if she had just jinxed them.</p>
  </div><div class="fff_chapter_notes fff_foot_notes"><b>Notes for the Chapter:</b><blockquote class="userstuff">
          <p>So, chapters will get longer as this goes on (I made an effort to keep them below 5000 words) and this story will get more and more AU as it goes on. New chapters will be added every Tuesday (because that seems appropriate) and Friday until completed.</p>
        </blockquote></div></div>
<a name="section0002"><h2>2. Welcome to Sunnyhell</h2></a>
<div class="story"><div class="userstuff module">
    
    <p>
  <strong>
    <em>Lucy</em>
  </strong>
</p>
<p>If things had been situation normal (driving down with her mom for Thanksgiving) the four hour drive on the highway would have had Lucy bored into a stupor. Trying to read in the car made her nauseous and her mom wouldn’t listen to anything but radio traffic reports no matter what music she suggested, so there wasn’t anything else to do but sleep or watch the other cars go by.</p>
<p>Things weren’t normal.</p>
<p>Her caseworker Cassandra didn’t say anything to her while she sat with her headphones over her ears listening to her favourite Green Day album (<em>Kerplunk</em>) and rested her forehead on the cool glass of the car window. She cursed when another driver tailgated them and Lucy cracked a smile, but that was the extent of their interaction until they were crossing the border into Sunnydale.</p>
<p>They got stuck behind a truck while they were passing the “Welcome to Sunnydale” sign. As they inched forwards, Lucy looked back and saw that someone had spray-painted over the back of the sign so that instead of saying “Now Leaving Sunnydale, Come Back Soon!” it said “You Survived Sunnyhell, DON’T Come Back Soon!”</p>
<p>“Seriously?” Lucy couldn’t help asking out loud.</p>
<p>“What is it?” Cassandra asked.</p>
<p>Lucy pointed out the sign in the rear-view mirror. When Cassandra didn’t reply she briefly thought about using her mind-reading but quickly decided that she’d rather not. Not without Quinn there to keep her grounded. Not on purpose. Not yet.</p>
<p>Quinn had always been there before. Lucy was sure that the only reason they had both survived whatever that crazy doctor had done to them was that they could use their new powers on each other. It was important to know that they weren’t hallucinating. Ever since Quinn had died on Monday, Lucy hadn’t cracked open the mental door that kept the rest of the world at bay. Even with that armour she had gotten a pounding headache at his funeral when his very ex-girlfriend made a scene, so she wasn’t exactly eager to try purposefully going without.</p>
<p>Lucy went back to listening to her music and looking out the window. They passed a lot of graveyards, or maybe it was one huge graveyard, before they finally pulled into the driveway of 1630 Revello Drive, Joyce and Buffy Summers’s new (to Lucy) house.</p>
<p>Cassandra turned in her seat to look at Lucy after she parked the car. “You’re going to be okay,” was all she had to say. Everything else had already been said in the days before.</p>
<p>“I hope so,” Lucy said.</p>
<p>As she got out of the car, Lucy turned off her cassette player and wrestled her headphones over her short, springy hair so that they hung out of the way around her neck. A few of the dark curls caught on her headphones. She didn’t know how to deal with her hair anymore now that it was growing in all curly instead of the random mess of curls and stubbornly straight strands that it seemed to be made up of before. She didn’t even have the option of shoving it into a ponytail while it was this short. She would just have to deal with it for a few more months until it grew out and hope that she wasn’t the only girl at school who favoured using scarfs to cover up bad hair days.</p>
<p>The door of the house was opened by Aunt Joy a split second after Cassandra rang the doorbell. She didn’t look like she had aged a day since Lucy had last seen her, probably because of the wide smile that crossed her face. “Lucy!”</p>
<p>“Aunt Joy,” Lucy said into Aunt Joy’s shoulder, as Aunt Joy had enveloped her in a hug as soon as she had seen her.</p>
<p>“Oh, honey, I’m so glad you’re alright,” Aunt Joy said. She released Lucy from her hug and looked her over with a concerned frown. “Are you alright? You look too thin.”</p>
<p>Lucy cracked a smile. “Growth spurt,” she lied.</p>
<p>She was glad that Aunt Joy hadn’t seen her last year. If she thought she was too thin now she would have been horrified to see what Lucy looked like after she had finished chemotherapy. Quinn had looked worse. Lucy at least had the weight to lose, since despite her best efforts short of starving herself she had never been what anyone would call skinny. Quinn was a basketball player and had already been all lean muscle before he started chemo. When he lost weight a skeleton would have looked healthier than him. Still, cancer had wrecked hell on both of them, and not just the treatment. Lucy had lost her lung (well, part of) and her mom, Quinn had lost his leg and his life.   </p>
<p>Aunt Joy ushered them inside while she and Cassandra were talking. Lucy didn’t bother to listen to them—she knew that Cassandra was giving Aunt Joy the legal spiel and probably working in veiled threats of bodily harm if Lucy wasn’t happy and safe—instead choosing to take a look around as much of her new home as she could see from the living room. Overall, the first floor seemed to have a neutral colour palette with cozy-looking furniture and simple, tasteful decorations that didn’t take over the rooms.</p>
<p>After a few minutes there was the sound of footsteps coming down the stairs. Then Buffy came bouncing into the room with a cheerleader grin plastered on her face. She had a wild look in her eyes, like she hadn’t been getting enough sleep and was running purely on adrenaline, but her face was free of dark under-eye circles and she didn’t have a hair out of place, so Lucy decided that she was probably imagining things.</p>
<p>“Buffy, why don’t you take Lucy upstairs and show her your room while we finish up here?” Aunt Joy suggested after the requisite greetings had been said.</p>
<p>“We won’t be much longer,” Cassandra said. “Then I’ll get out of your hair and let you have your family bonding time.”</p>
<p>Buffy shrugged. “Okay.”</p>
<p>Lucy shot Cassandra a look before she followed Buffy up the stairs that Cassandra responded to with a nod. She wasn’t a mind-reader, but Lucy trusted that her caseworker had known what she was thinking. They had talked about it enough times. It was Lucy’s one demand that no one else except for her doctors know about her medical history. She wanted to forget about it and put it behind her, and she couldn’t do that if everyone around her was thinking about “that poor girl with cancer” every time they saw her. It was legal, it was fine.</p>
<p>Buffy’s room was nice. It was much bigger than her old room, but Lucy was kind of distracted by the lack of floor space caused by the second bed pushed up against the wall opposite one of the two (!?) windows, crowded by the dressing table at its head and Buffy’s bed at its foot. “I’m going to be sleeping in here?”</p>
<p>“Oh, yeah,” Buffy said. “We haven’t gotten the third bedroom cleaned out yet, it’s holding a bunch of stuff for Mom’s art gallery.”</p>
<p>“Just tell me that you don’t snore,” Lucy said, putting a playful smile on her face. She wasn’t really worried about snoring. She couldn’t keep her mental walls up while she was sleeping. With Buffy in the same room she was sure to end up having no dreams of her own and just looking in on Buffy’s. That was annoying and way too voyeuristic for her liking. Physical walls in between them would turn Buffy and Aunt Joy’s dreams into easily ignorable background noise. Well, at least Buffy wasn’t likely to have too many R-rated dreams, unlike some of the people Lucy had shared hospital rooms with.</p>
<p>Buffy grinned. “Not that I know of.” She sat down on the foot of her bed and stretched her arms above her head. “My friends and I are heading to the Bronze tonight. Do you want to come? You know, if you’re feeling up to it.”</p>
<p>Lucy sat down next to her cousin. “Depends. What’s the Bronze?”</p>
<p>Buffy excitedly told her about the all-ages club that they liked to go to and how much her friends, especially a girl called Willow, wanted to meet her, and somehow got Lucy to agree to go. Maybe it was because she had mentioned live music. Lucy never got to go anywhere with live music, even before she had been science experimented into pseudo Jean Grey.</p>
<p>Lucy excused herself from dinner early so that she could start unpacking, and so that she could get away from the sad look that Aunt Joy had on her face when she thought that Lucy wasn’t looking. It wasn’t long before Buffy came upstairs and told her to get dressed so they would be ready to leave when Willow and her other friend Xander got there.</p>
<p>Lucy looked down at the sweatpants and t-shirt she was wearing. “How dressed up am I supposed to get?”</p>
<p>That was the wrong question to ask.</p>
<p>Before she knew what was happening, Lucy had been dragged to the closet and had something that appeared to be an outfit shoved into her hands.      </p>
<p>“This shirt and this skirt,” Buffy said. “Get changed, then I’ll do your makeup.”</p>
<p>Lucy looked at the black and green layers of fabric. “I haven’t shaved...”</p>
<p>Buffy went over to Lucy’s bed, picked a pair of dark blue jeans out of her pile of clothing, and threw them at her head. “The shirt has sleeves. Go!”</p>
<p>Lucy pulled the jeans off her face and couldn’t stop the genuine smile that followed. While Buffy dove back into the closet for her own outfit, Lucy turned around and got changed faster than she ever had before. She was taller than Buffy, so the green crop top sat higher than it probably should have but it was loose enough that it wasn’t totally indecent.</p>
<p>Buffy did their makeup and looped the chain of a green rhinestone cross around Lucy’s neck. “Crosses are in,” she said when Lucy asked why she was wearing it. “Even Willow wears them sometimes, and she’s Jewish.”</p>
<p>“Isn’t that blasphemy or something?” Lucy asked. Buffy shrugged and put her own cross around her neck.</p>
<p>Willow and Xander were waiting for them in the entryway when they came downstairs. Lucy thought that she would feel awkward surrounded by people younger than her, even if it only was by a year, but as they walked to the Bronze she felt remarkably at ease. She credited Willow with that. The redheaded girl had an adorable tendency for babbling and a warm personality that could make anyone feel like they belonged.</p>
<p>“Do you think Angel will be here?” Willow asked as they neared the crowd and noise that could only mark the entrance to the club.</p>
<p>“I sincerely hope not,” Xander said.</p>
<p>“Who’s Angel?” Lucy asked.</p>
<p>Willow smiled. “Buffy’s boyfriend.”</p>
<p>“He’s only sort of my boyfriend,” Buffy said quickly. “I’m sort of girlfriendy with him.”</p>
<p>Willow’s smile grew wider. “Sure.”</p>
<p>Lucy smirked. “Well, I hope he shows up. I need to properly threaten him.”</p>
<p>Willow and Xander burst out laughing while Buffy looked like she wasn’t sure if she should join them or be mad at Lucy for threatening to threaten her sort of boyfriend.</p>
<p>The Bronze was crowded and full of energy. The music wasn’t bad, the drinks were cold, and there were plenty of out of the way corners to read in without getting in anyone’s way. Lucy was actually enjoying herself before a headache started pulsing at her temples. She groaned quietly. A headache was to be expected with this many people in the same building all feeling pretty strong emotions, but that didn’t make it hurt any less.</p>
<p>Lucy turned in her chair and tapped Willow on the shoulder. “Hey, Willow, I’m going to head outside for a bit. The noise in here is getting to me.”</p>
<p>Willow stopped watching Buffy and Xander dance and turned to Lucy with something like panic in her eyes. “Oh, well, I’ll come with you. It’s kind of dangerous to be outside by yourself, you know?”</p>
<p>“I’m not going far,” Lucy said, “just by the cars out front. There are plenty of people there. Besides, someone has to watch the drinks.”</p>
<p>She hopped out of her seat and headed towards the front door. “I’ll scream if anything happens,” she said to Willow over her shoulder.</p>
<p>It was a lot cooler outside than it was inside the Bronze. The crowd clustered around the entrance had thinned to a handful of people, most of them smoking and drinking on the hoods of their cars. Lucy walked a few steps away from the last occupied car and stood by the wall of the Bronze. She took a quick look at the other people around her who weren’t smoking or drinking and tried to mimic them to act like she belonged there. It didn’t feel like it was working.</p>
<p>“You want one?”</p>
<p>Lucy jumped and turned to face the man that had silently come up beside her and spoken in her ear. He was holding an open pack of cigarettes that he tilted towards her. Lucy quickly shook her head and took half a step back. “No, thank you.”</p>
<p>The man studied her before slipping the cigarette pack into his jacket. “Oh right, Buffy’s friends don’t smoke.” While the man lit his cigarette, Lucy returned the favour and looked him over. His hair was peroxide blond and cut short, standing straight up on top of his head. His coat was a black leather duster that covered him almost to his ankles. He spoke with a—what was it called?— cockney English accent that was so, so out of place in California.</p>
<p>“You know Buffy?” Lucy asked.</p>
<p>“Course I know Buffy,” the man said around his cigarette. “She’s only my arch nemesis, ain’t she?”</p>
<p>Lucy raised her eyebrows (she had never mastered the art of raising one at a time). “Arch nemesis?”</p>
<p>The man smiled. “There’s a story there, if you’d like to hear it.”</p>
<p>Oddly, Lucy did want to hear it. She didn’t usually like talking to people, but this man was quite interesting. First though, she wanted to know his name.</p>
<p>“You can call me Spike,” he told her. “And you are?”</p>
<p>“Lucy. Buffy’s cousin.”</p>
<p>Spike smirked. “Her cousin, are you? Well, this just got interesting.”</p>
<p>Lucy felt a shiver go down her spine. “What do you mean by that?”</p>
<p>“I mean you might actually come back from the little trip I had planned.”</p>
<p>Lucy immediately turned and ran back towards the entrance of the Bronze. Spike grabbed her before she made it two feet and clasped one hand over her mouth to muffle her screams. She struggled but was unable to break free even though he was only holding her with one arm against his chest. With his other hand he squeezed her neck until she saw spots, then nothing at all.</p>
  </div></div>
<a name="section0003"><h2>3. Killing the Slayer</h2></a>
<div class="story"><div class="userstuff module">
    
    <p>
  <strong>
    <em>Spike</em>
  </strong>
</p>
<p>Spike dumped the unconscious girl on the carpet next to the bed. “I’ve brought you a present, Dru.”</p>
<p>Drusilla looked down at the human girl from her seat on the edge of her bed. “Oh, Spike, she’s lovely. Our pretty kitten.” She stroked the girl’s cheek, leaving behind shallow cuts from her fingernails.</p>
<p> “She’s the Slayer’s family,” Spike said. “I was thinking that while you have a little snack I’ll go offer the Slayer a trade. What do you think, pet?”</p>
<p>“We’ll have a tea party,” Drusilla mused. “There’ll be crumpets and cake, chocolate cake.”</p>
<p>Spike translated that as enthusiastic agreement. While Drusilla hummed to herself and rearranged her dolls, he made sure that the human was properly tied up before taking the cross from her neck and carefully putting it in a pocket of his jacket. He left part of the chain hanging out so that he wouldn’t be at risk of touching the cross itself. The necklace wouldn’t make as much of a point as something like a severed finger, but it was less messy and the Slayer would be more likely to believe him when he said her cousin was unharmed.</p>
<p>“I’ll be back soon, princess. Don’t have too much fun without me.”</p>
<p>Drusilla giggled. “Only a little bit of fun.” She linked her pinky with the human girl’s. “Pinky promise.”</p>
<p>For the second time that night, Spike left the factory that he and Drusilla had taken over after killing the Annoying One. He decided to head back to the club where he’d seen the Slayer and her friends since they would probably still be in that area. It was easy for him to get into the club and then he immediately saw the Slayer, the redhead girl, and the boy with the god-awful shirts who Peaches somehow hadn’t eaten out of pure annoyance standing at a table by the door in the middle of a frantic discussion.</p>
<p>Spike walked over to them. “Am I interrupting something?”</p>
<p>The Slayer growled, actually growled, at him and clenched her fists. She had vampire dust in her hair. “What do you want?”</p>
<p>“Just here to make a delivery.” Spike dropped the cross necklace from the Slayer’s cousin on the table.</p>
<p>The Slayer glared. “Where is she?”</p>
<p>“Safe,” Spike said, “for now. If you want her to stay that way I think you’ll have to take her place.”</p>
<p>“Or,” the boy said, “and hear me out, we could just kill you now and then go look for her.”</p>
<p>“You could,” Spike admitted. “But she’s one human put in with, let’s say, thirty vampires and if I don’t make it back who knows what could happen to her.”</p>
<p>“Where do you want to meet?” the Slayer demanded.</p>
<p>“Sunnydale Cemetery in half an hour,” Spike said. “No weapons, just the three of you.”</p>
<p>“Fine,” the Slayer said.</p>
<p>“Fine. See you there.” Spike nodded to the redhead girl who hadn’t said anything since he’d arrived and then left the club.</p>
<p>By the time he got back to the factory Drusilla had had her snack and arranged the girl’s body on the bed like a sleeping princess in some twisted fairy story, with skin of sand instead of snow and tears red as blood thanks to the cuts on her cheek. The bite mark that Drusilla had left in her neck was still weeping blood, staining her pale brown skin with sweet-smelling ruby droplets.</p>
<p>“You left her alive then?” Spike asked. It was possible that Drusilla hadn’t yet gotten around to killing the girl. She did like to play with her food.</p>
<p>“The poor little kitten has lost her mittens and will need new ones,” Drusilla said. “I don’t kill her, you do.”</p>
<p>Spike stepped towards the girl. “Well then, just let me kill her and then—”</p>
<p>“Not yet,” Drusilla interrupted. “We haven’t even had a tea party.”</p>
<p>Spike thought about just killing the girl anyway, but that would make Drusilla upset. He didn’t like making Drusilla upset.</p>
<p>The girl stirred. Her movement made her neck bleed more and Spike briefly wondered if her blood would taste as good as it smelled before she surprised him by returning to full consciousness in less than a second. She blinked once before sitting up, swinging herself off of the bed, and grabbing the mattress before she could fall flat on her face. Drusilla had untied her hands but her ankles were still bound together.</p>
<p>Spike and Drusilla watched as the girl caught her balance and stood up straight facing them. She stared at Spike with big brown eyes that didn’t show a hint of fear. If it hadn’t been for her heartbeat speeding up he would have thought that she wasn’t frightened at all.</p>
<p>“If you’re going to kill me, would you just get it over with?” the girl said at last.</p>
<p>Drusilla giggled and clapped her hands in delight. “I like you! My name is Drusilla, what’s yours?”</p>
<p>The girl looked at Drusilla. “Lucy,” she managed to get out before sagging backwards. She would have hit her head on the floor if Spike hadn’t stepped forward and caught her.</p>
<p>Spike placed the girl back on the bed. “None of that, kitten. We need you in one piece.”</p>
<p>The girl looked confused. “You’re not going to kill me?”</p>
<p>Spike smiled at Drusilla. “Not if my pet doesn’t want me to.”</p>
<p>Drusilla smiled back. “You’re so sweet, Spike. Like a pancreas.”</p>
<p>The girl rolled over and curled in on herself, clutching her head. She whimpered. “What are you?”</p>
<p>“We’re vampires, Lucy,” Drusilla said. “Will you dance with us under the moonlight?”</p>
<p>The girl didn’t respond. Drusilla quickly grew bored and went to play with her dolls. Spike stood by the stairs and watched them for a few moments. Then he went over to the bed and untied the girl.</p>
<p>“Get up, kitten,” he ordered. “We’ve got a meeting to get to.”</p>
<p>“My Spike will kill the Slayer,” Drusilla said as Spike pushed the girl up the stairs. “And then we’ll have tea.”</p>
<p>The girl tensed when they arrived above ground, probably because of all the vampires in the factory walking around in full demon face, but she kept walking. Spike drafted three of the vampire minions to make up numbers and they walked to the cemetery.</p>
<p>The Slayer and her friends were already in the cemetery, waiting. Spike didn’t see any weapons on them but he knew that they had to have brought at least a few stakes and crosses. They were humans, not stupid.</p>
<p>“Hand her over, Spike,” the Slayer ordered.</p>
<p>Spike tightened his grip on the Slayer’s cousin’s shoulder. “That’s not how a trade works Slayer.”</p>
<p>The Slayer clenched her jaw. “Xander, get Lucy.”</p>
<p>“You got it, boss,” the human boy said.</p>
<p> The Slayer and the human boy walked towards Spike and his minions. They stopped a few feet away. Spike marched the Slayer’s cousin forwards and pushed her in the direction of the human boy before grabbing the Slayer.</p>
<p>Before Spike could snap her neck, the Slayer threw her head back and broke his nose. At the same time she stomped hard on his foot and twisted her wrist so that a cross on her bracelet made full contact with his hand. Spike let out a yell and released the Slayer before the cross could burn through his hand.</p>
<p>“Kill them all!” he ordered through clenched teeth.</p>
<p>The three other vampires (they were Alex, Carmen and Julia, right?) launched themselves at the humans. Spike wasn’t able to keep track of how his minions were doing because he was busy fighting with the Slayer. When the Slayer let up for a second he saw that two of his minions had been dusted and the third, a blond female who he was pretty sure was Julia, was being held at bay by the cross the Slayer’s cousin was holding out at arm’s length. Spike growled. This was not going as planned.</p>
<p>Deciding to cut his losses, Spike shouted for Julia to leave before sending the Slayer tumbling over a headstone and running away while she was hitting the ground. He paused for a second behind the Slayer’s cousin and whispered in her ear.</p>
<p>“See you soon.”  </p>
<p>The girl jumped and spun around, but he was already gone.</p>
  </div></div>
<a name="section0004"><h2>4. Everything's Fine</h2></a>
<div class="story"><div class="userstuff module">
    
    <p>
  <strong>
    <em>Buffy</em>
  </strong>
</p><p>They were lucky, but not surprised, that Giles was at home on a Friday night. His life revolved around books and the supernatural, that didn’t make it likely that he’d be out partying.</p><p>Buffy had introduced Lucy to Giles as soon as they got inside but it wasn’t until she was halfway through telling him what had happened that Lucy spoke for the first time since Spike had brought her to the graveyard.</p><p>“This is a dream,” Lucy said, making the rest of them look at her. “This is a dream, and I would like to wake up now.”</p><p>Giles sighed. “I’m afraid it’s not. A dream, that is.”</p><p>Lucy blinked at him. “I knew that. I just wanted to spend a bit more time in denial.”</p><p>“Oh. Well, carry on then,” Giles said.</p><p>Lucy shook her head. “Too late.”</p><p>“We could try to convince you that it was just a gang on PCP?” Xander offered. “Or the low light making you see things that weren’t there? We’ve used that excuse before, it works like a charm.”</p><p>Lucy gave him a strained smile and went back to staring into her mug of tea. Willow, who was sitting next to her on Giles’s couch, patted her on the shoulder. Lucy winced obviously.</p><p>Willow quickly drew her hand back. “Sorry!”</p><p>“S’okay,” Lucy said. “That one’s starting to bruise, that’s all. Spike said you’re the Slayer.”</p><p>It took a few seconds for Buffy to realize that Lucy was talking to her. “What? Oh, yeah, that’s me. Buffy the vampire Slayer.”</p><p>“He said that he’ll see me soon,” Lucy continued without acknowledging that Buffy had spoken. “He really wants to kill you.”</p><p>That wasn’t good. Well, Spike wanting to kill Buffy wasn’t news, but him taking an interest in Lucy? Buffy, Xander, Willow and Giles exchanged worried looks.</p><p>“He really wants to kill you,” Lucy repeated. She set her jaw and looked up. The cuts on her cheek shone like war paint. “How do you kill vampires?”</p><p>Buffy spent the rest of the weekend teaching her cousin about vampires and the slayage of such. Mom was glad that they were spending time together, and even gladder that Lucy didn’t accumulate any more injuries. They had told her that they had to break up a fight at the Bronze (“This one girl had really sharp nails.”) but Lucy getting hurt within twelve hours of being in Mom’s care still wouldn’t look great for her. Social services in Sunnydale were probably as useless as the police department though, so Buffy didn’t think anyone would be asking about it any time soon.</p><p>Giles wanted to see if Lucy was able to lead them to Spike’s hideout, but Buffy pointed out that Lucy had only arrived in Sunnydale that day and Lucy confirmed that all the streets had looked the same to her, so he dropped it and went back to digging out the beginner’s books on the supernatural for Lucy to read.</p><p>Aside from the Sunnydale crash course there was no need for any fighting or weapons over the weekend. Not even the minioniest of vampire minions poked their heads above ground, maybe because Spike was taking his anger out on them? A girl could hope.</p><p>Lucy was lying on her bed reading one of the books Giles had given her when Buffy got back from Willow’s house on Sunday night. “Hey, Buffy, what did you say your boyfriend’s name was?”</p><p>Buffy went over to her dressing table and started taking off her jewellery. “Angel,” she said. “Why?”</p><p>“Oh, this name just made me want to strangle someone and I didn’t know why.” Lucy held up the book. “It makes sense now, ‘Angelus’ and ‘Angel’ are pretty close, even though this can’t be your guy. He’s a vampire, and there’s no way you could be dating a vampire.”</p><p>Buffy tensed as Lucy spoke. She didn’t dare to look sideways at her cousin, afraid that Lucy would somehow be able to read the truth on her face.</p><p>“Buffy?” Lucy asked. “You have a worried face. Why is your face worried?” Not looking at her hadn’t helping.</p><p>“Well,” Buffy said slowly, “Angel is definitely in possession of a soul.”</p><p>Lucy raised her eyebrows. “Okay...”</p><p>“But he is a vampire.”</p><p>Lucy’s eyebrows crept even higher up her forehead and she blinked several times. “Vampires can have souls? Doesn’t being a vampire mean by definition that they don’t have a soul?”</p><p>“Angel was cursed with his,” Buffy explained. “I think he’s doing the whole redemption thing. No more evil doing for him.” She hadn’t looked up anything that Angel had done before he got his soul back, mostly because she didn’t want to know, but from what Giles had told them there was a lot of bad for Angel to be redeemed from.</p><p>Lucy nodded slowly. “Okay. Anything else I should know? Aside from the fact that you’re dating a vampire, because I don’t really want to think about that right now.”</p><p>Buffy didn’t want to tell her. She really didn’t want to tell her. Lucy seemed to only be getting over being kidnapped by Spike by learning as much as she could about vampires, putting it into a box labelled something like “Vampires=Totally Evil” and, as of just now, ignoring anything that didn’t fix in the box. Trying to connect “Angelus who did terrible things” to “Angel who Buffy is dating” might break her brain. But the longer she stayed silent the longer Lucy stared at her, and within a few seconds her resolve broke.</p><p>“When Angel didn’t have a soul he used to go by Angelus.”</p><p>Buffy sat down on her bed and waited. When Lucy didn’t appear from behind the book for a full minute she started to get worried. Then Lucy sat up, put down the book and looked at Buffy with a totally blank face.</p><p>“This Angelus?” Lucy asked, pointing at the book.</p><p>Buffy nodded. She was pretty sure there was only one major vampire called Angelus.</p><p>“This Angelus,” Lucy said, “was part of a group of vampires that this book calls the Scourge of Europe. They killed and tortured hundreds of thousands of people across Europe for two hundred years—for fun.”</p><p>Buffy let out a small, awkward laugh. “I did mention that Angel’s doing the redemption thing, right?”</p><p>“You didn’t mention that he and <em>Spike </em>were the most violent, destructive and sadistic vampires in the Scourge, possibly in all of history. And Spike’s reputation is only second to Angelus’s.”</p><p>“Maybe I didn’t know that?” Buffy said. Angel had only said that <em>Spike</em> was the worst.</p><p>Lucy sighed and closed the book. “I think I’m going to try to sleep now. Are you patrolling?”</p><p>“Nope. It’s been so quiet since...Friday that Giles is giving me the night off.”</p><p>Lucy raised her eyebrows. “Isn’t that asking for trouble?”</p><p>Buffy shrugged. “Angel’s going to do a few rounds. Should be fine.” At least she hoped that it would be fine. This was the Hellmouth after all.</p><p>Lucy looked at her for a few seconds. “Okay. You’re the Slayer. I call the bathroom first tomorrow.”</p><p>“Hey, no fair!” Buffy said.</p><p>Lucy stuck her tongue out at her and pulled her blankets over her head. “Goodnight!”</p><p>Buffy rolled her eyes and resolved to wake up earlier to get to the bathroom first. “Goodnight.”</p>
  </div></div>
<a name="section0005"><h2>5. Underworld</h2></a>
<div class="story"><div class="userstuff module">
    
    <p>
  <strong>
    <em>Lucy</em>
  </strong>
</p>
<p>After waking up just enough to beat Buffy to the bathroom, Lucy practically sleepwalked through the morning. Buffy had nightmares for most of the night and the vampires from them made their way into Lucy’s nightmares once Buffy’s dreams got quiet enough (read: less nightmarey and more romancey) for Lucy to somewhat have her own. So Lucy’s entire night was basically a really bad acid trip (judging by the mind of that one guy in the hospital waiting room who had been on an acid trip) with vampires. It wasn’t a great way to start her first day at a new school, but she was pretty sure that once she got some caffeine and sugar in her she’d be able to power through the day no problem.</p>
<p>Then she met Principal Snyder.</p>
<p>She wasn’t actually sure what happened. She remembered going over her grades but other than that the meeting was a blur of thinly veiled and completely not veiled threats and insults. She ended up outside the principal’s office with her head spinning and several pieces of paper clutched in her hand. She took one step and collided with Willow. Lucy just blinked.</p>
<p>“Are you okay?” Willow asked. “You didn’t get possessed by anything, did you?”</p>
<p>Lucy blinked again. “I don’t think so. Does that happen often?”</p>
<p>Willow nodded. “Xander got possessed by a hyena last year. It was pretty oogy, but he doesn’t remember any of it.”</p>
<p>“Oh,” Lucy said. “No, I’m not possessed. He,” she gestured towards Snyder’s closed door, “really doesn’t like Buffy, does he?”</p>
<p>“Definitely not,” Willow agreed. “He doesn’t like anyone, really. Can we go to the library now? I don’t want to miss class.”</p>
<p>Lucy shook the lingering merry-go-rounds out of her head. “Right, textbooks. Yes please.” Books were the way to get her out of this mess and back to sense, even if they were just textbooks.</p>
<p>Willow led the way to the library. The contrast between the crowds outside in the hallway and the emptiness of the library was stark. It was so quiet that the headache that Lucy had starting up disappeared instantly, despite the hundreds of teenagers just a doorway away.</p>
<p>Mr. Giles was happy to help them find Lucy’s textbooks. Lucy took a cautious peek into his mind and had a hard time not laughing at the swearing he was doing over a particularly tricky translation. Once she had all her schoolbooks (plus a few more vampire and occult books that Mr. Giles gave her when she mentioned that she’d finished reading the ones she already had), Lucy found her locker and then her first class, biology, with a little help from Willow before Buffy grabbed Willow for some last minute homework help. Lucy hovered outside the door to her biology class for a few minutes before sticking her head inside and seeing that there were already four other students there. Emboldened by the fact that she wouldn’t be the only one in the room, Lucy went inside and introduced herself to the teacher.</p>
<p>The other students, four boys, didn’t look up when she approached the lab desk that they were gathered around. “We need to find someone,” one of the two dark-haired boys was saying, “or we’ll sound incomplete.”</p>
<p>Lucy coughed quietly and the boys looked at her. “Hi? Sorry, Mr. Charles said that there was a free seat here.”</p>
<p>“No problem,” the blue-eyed boy with curly ginger hair said. “Sam can grab another chair.”</p>
<p>The dark-haired boy who hadn’t spoken did so and Lucy slid into the seat he had vacated, the one next to the boy with purple hair.</p>
<p>“Hi,” the purple-haired boy said.</p>
<p>“Hi,” Lucy said. “Uh, I’m Lucy.”</p>
<p>The purple-haired boy nodded. “Oz.”</p>
<p>“I’m Sam,” Sam said. “This is Devon and that’s Soul, you know, cause he’s a ginger.”</p>
<p>Lucy tilted her head (being careful not reveal the healing vampire bite that was covered by a scarf). A soulless ginger joke. She couldn’t decide if that was juvenile or cute.</p>
<p>“Cute,” she settled on after a mental coin toss. Soul ducked his head, blushing.</p>
<p>“Do you play electric guitar?” Devon demanded.</p>
<p>Lucy blinked. “What?”</p>
<p>“Can you play electric guitar?” Devon asked again. “Our rhythm guitarist went missing and we’re playing at the Shelter tonight. We <em>need </em>someone on rhythm guitar or our set will go belly up.”</p>
<p>“We’ve played without rhythm guitar before,” Soul muttered.</p>
<p>“Not at the Shelter,” Devon said with evident frustration.</p>
<p>“You guys are a band?” Lucy asked.</p>
<p>Sam grinned. “Dingoes Ate My Baby.”</p>
<p>“What?” Lucy asked again.</p>
<p>“That’s the name of our band,” Soul explained. Lucy nodded in understanding.</p>
<p>Devon clapped his hands. “Rhythm guitar, people. Focus!”</p>
<p>“I haven’t played an electric guitar before,” Lucy admitted. The memory of gentle hands guiding her fingers across guitar strings made her pause for a moment. “My boyfriend taught me to play acoustic but—”</p>
<p>“Perfect,” Devon interrupted. “Rehearsal is after school at Oz’s place. We’ll get you caught up.”</p>
<p>Before Lucy could say anything, the bell rang and all the boys except for Oz scattered to go to their assigned seats. Lucy turned to look at Oz with what she was sure was a look of utter bewilderment on her face. Oz just shrugged.</p>
<p>Since reading Mr. Giles’s mind hadn’t made her head explode, Lucy quickly skimmed over what the four boys were thinking before the classroom could fill up. Oz’s mind was busy but mellow, not maniac like Drusilla’s mind had been (and Drusilla’s mind really wasn’t a fun place to be). The other boys were pretty average. Sam and Soul were crushing on each other so hard that Lucy was seriously thinking about playing matchmaker. None of them seemed to have any ulterior motives, but considering some of the stories Buffy had been telling Lucy was going to take that analysis with a grain of salt.   </p>
<p>Lucy made it through the rest of the school day without getting recruited into any more bands. She got stared at a lot in class, whether it was because she was the new girl or because she was usually the only non-white person in the room she didn’t know, but no one was ever too hostile to her. That may have had something to do with Devon dragging her over to eat with the rest of the band at lunch. The Dingoes guys seemed to be pretty well liked at Sunnydale High.</p>
<p>After school, Buffy was dawdling with Willow and Xander on the stairs up to the school building when Lucy came outside. She waved to Lucy and Lucy waved back.</p>
<p>Someone grabbed Lucy’s shoulder. Lucy spun around and managed to stop her fist half an inch from Sam’s face.</p>
<p>Sam stepped back with his hands up. “Easy! Are you always this jumpy?”</p>
<p>Lucy shook her head. “Sorry, bad weekend. Did you need something?”</p>
<p>“Just wanted to let you know that Oz is driving,” Sam said. “We’re meeting in the parking lot in ten.”</p>
<p>“Alright, just let me let my cousin know where we’re headed.” Lucy gestured behind her towards where she had last seen Buffy. Sam nodded.</p>
<p>Lucy turned back around and saw that Buffy had moved and was now standing over by a car with a brunette girl talking to a man in a yellow button-up shirt. Xander and Willow were still at the top of the stairs. Lucy walked over to them.</p>
<p>“What’s the what?” she asked, pointing towards Buffy.</p>
<p>“College frat guys,” Willow said. “Cordelia said they wanted to meet Buffy.”</p>
<p>“They look very untrustworthy, don’t they?” Xander said. “We should go make sure they don’t try anything.”</p>
<p>Lucy put a hand on his arm before he could take a step. “I’ll go. I need to talk to Buffy anyway.”</p>
<p>“I expect you to use a very disapproving look,” Xander told her as she left.</p>
<p>“No, Richard, I’m pretty sure you’re playing easy to resist,” a man in a blue sweater was saying to the man in the yellow shirt. Buffy walked away in a huff and Blue Sweater chased after her.</p>
<p>Richard turned his eyes towards Lucy, looking her up and down before he spoke. “And who are you?”</p>
<p>“Nunya,” Lucy said flatly.</p>
<p>Richard gave a smarmy smile. “Exotic. Do you have a last name?”</p>
<p>“Nunya business.”</p>
<p>The girl, Cordelia, let out a laugh that she cut off with a hand over her mouth. Richard scowled. Then his thoughts suddenly became so loud that Lucy had to open the door in her mind before it got broken down.</p>
<p><em>...bitch! Glad we only need two more for the sacrifice, </em>was the first thing that Lucy heard him think. Then there were very detailed thoughts about the sacrifice that Lucy knew she would not be able to unsee for a very long time, especially thanks to the demon snake thing that added to her stockpile of nightmare fuel. She also knew that demonic sacrifices were Slayer and Watcher business, so she gritted her teeth and watched the whole thing. She used the disapproving look that Xander had requested to cover her nausea.</p>
<p>Once Richard’s thoughts had turned from demon feeding to why this freaky girl was staring at him, Lucy closed the door and turned to look at Cordelia instead. “Cordelia, right? Nice to meet you.”</p>
<p>“Yeah, you too,” Cordelia said in a dazed tone.</p>
<p>Lucy tapped Buffy on the shoulder and told her that she had band practice. Buffy just said “Uh huh,” and went back to talking to Blue Sweater.</p>
<p>“She’s going to walk away,” Xander said while Lucy walked back up the stairs. “Now. Right now.”</p>
<p>“Since Buffy seems to be distracted, would you let her know that I’m going to Daniel Osbourne’s place for band practice?” Lucy asked Willow.</p>
<p>“Oh, yeah sure,” Willow said. “Where?”</p>
<p>“1648 Revello Drive,” Lucy recited. “Just a few houses down from us.”</p>
<p>Willow nodded. “Got it. Have fun.”</p>
<p>Band practice was fun in an “oh my god that was exhausting but totally worth it” sort of way. Devon was fanatical about making sure that all of their parts fit together seamlessly, even with Lucy never having played with them before. Sam and Soul just went with it and rolled their eyes behind his back, while Oz didn’t even bother wasting the energy on the extra movement. At last, Devon declared that they were as ready as they would ever be and told them to go have dinner and get changed.</p>
<p>“Get changed into what?” Lucy asked Oz as she put away the guitar he had lent her.</p>
<p>Oz shrugged. “Leather is usually a safe bet for the Shelter.”</p>
<p>That was not encouraging.</p>
<p>Lucy walked to her aunt’s house (the sun wasn’t anywhere near set so it was perfectly safe, from vampires anyway) and was immediately attacked by Aunt Joy the moment she opened the door.</p>
<p>“Where have you been?” Aunt Joy shouted. “I’ve been so worried!”</p>
<p>“I was just down the street,” Lucy said while trying not to be smothered by the hug Aunt Joy was giving her. “Didn’t Buffy tell you?”</p>
<p>She hadn’t.</p>
<p>After Aunt Joy scolded Buffy for almost a solid five minutes, the three of them sat down and had dinner. Lucy made sure to clearly explain where she would be going and who she would be with. Multiple times.</p>
<p>“The Shelter?” Buffy said. “Giles mentioned it before. He said it was the safest public space in Sunnydale, or something like that.”</p>
<p>Lucy raised her eyebrows. “Really?”</p>
<p>Buffy shrugged and quickly looked at her mom. “They probably have really good security or something.”</p>
<p>Lucy announced that she was recruiting Buffy to help her choose an outfit and Buffy immediately dragged her upstairs, leaving all the dishes on the table. Lucy was just able to see Aunt Joy rolling her eyes.    </p>
<p>“So, leather,” Buffy said. “Ooh!” She dove into Lucy’s side of the bursting closet and came out with a shirt that Lucy didn’t even remember owning. “Leather.”</p>
<p>The shirt was a white pleather tank top with red lacing going from the neckline down to the middle of the front of the shirt. There wasn’t enough material for the shirt to close completely in the front.</p>
<p>“That has ‘bite me’ written all over it,” Lucy said. “And your mom will never let me out of the house wearing it.”</p>
<p>Buffy shrugged and put the shirt back. “I don’t think she’d mind. How about this?”</p>
<p>It only took a few minutes for Lucy to get dressed. The only other “leather” she owned was red pants that she had probably bought with the shirt during one of Rose’s dad-sponsored shopping trips and a Halloween costume. She chose a different white shirt that didn’t show half of her chest to go with the pants and Buffy lent her low-heeled short black boots that she would be able to run in. Then they accessorized with a cross necklace, one of Lucy’s many scarves, and a purse holding stakes, extra crosses and a bottle of holy water.   </p>
<p>“Angel and I are patrolling tonight, so if you get attacked by anything, scream,” Buffy said, “loudly.”</p>
<p>“Before or after I start running for my life?” Lucy asked. “You didn’t cover this in training.”</p>
<p>Buffy laughed. “Before and after.”</p>
<p>Lucy gave a small smile. “That’s what I thought.”</p>
<hr/>
<p>It was the first time Lucy had been out after dark without Buffy since being kidnapped by Spike. She tried to stay calm but ended up getting so tense that Oz noticed even while he was driving.</p>
<p>“You’ll be fine,” he whispered to her while they were unloading Soul’s drum kit. “You did great during practice.”</p>
<p>“Thanks,” Lucy whispered back, “but it’s not the music I’m worried about.”</p>
<p>She looked towards the bouncer that Devon was talking to, specifically the twig-sized antlers sticking out from his hair. Nothing else about the man screamed demon, and the antlers could definitely just be a costume, but he was making her even more nervous.</p>
<p>Oz followed her gaze. “People dress weird here. Just be cool.”</p>
<p>“Cool?” Lucy repeated. “I’m a teacher’s pet. I like reading. I don’t know how to be cool.”</p>
<p>Oz just smiled. Well, almost smiled.</p>
<p>The bouncer gave each of them a metal bracelet with “BAND” stamped onto it before letting them inside. He also checked their bags (Lucy’s purse and Sam’s backpack) for any weapons or drugs that he admitted he wasn’t expecting to find. Sam got through fine but when it was Lucy’s turn the bouncer stared at the contents of her purse before pulling her aside.</p>
<p>“Are you plannin’ on using any of this?” he asked in a low voice that the rest of the band wouldn’t be able to hear.</p>
<p>“What do you mean?” Lucy asked, trying to make herself sound as innocent as possible.</p>
<p>The bouncer growled and Lucy flinched. “Stakes, holy water, we’ve got patrons that don’t react well to those sort of things. The Shelter is neutral ground. No fightin’, no killin’.”</p>
<p>Lucy swallowed. “As long as no one attacks me or my friends, I won’t have to use them.”</p>
<p>“Fair enough,” the (definitely a demon) bouncer grumbled. “We don’t allow offensive magic either.”</p>
<p>That wouldn’t be a problem since Lucy didn’t know any magic (reading step-by-step protective rituals didn’t count), but she didn’t want to tell the bouncer that. She just nodded.</p>
<p>“What was that about?” Sam asked once the bouncer let her through. “Your fake ID almost get caught?”</p>
<p>Lucy rolled her eyes. “I don’t have a fake ID.”        </p>
<p>For as early in the night as it was, the club was already pretty full. They came in through a side door between the stage and the bar and had to move very carefully to avoid hitting anyone with instruments while they carried them in to set up. The boys didn’t seem at all fazed by the patrons, but Lucy had to use half of her willpower not to let out the scream that would make Buffy drop everything and run to help her. (The other half was adding extra soundproofing to her mental door in preparation for withstanding the constant buzz of thoughts coming from the patrons. Tonight was not a good night to have a crippling headache.)</p>
<p>A vampire was sitting at the bar with his “true demonic visage” firmly in place, sipping from a glass of thick, red liquid. Blood, obviously. The bartender herself had white hair and midnight blue skin that blended nearly seamlessly with her black leather bodysuit. Three women with antlers like the bouncer’s were sitting around a table, laughing at something a blue-skinned man was saying. There were men with red eyes and tattoos covering every visible inch of their skin, beautiful girls with mossy green teeth and cloven hooves peeking out from under their floor-length skirts, and one man with loose, sagging skin and drooping ears. On the dance floor, a girl with leathery wings was dancing between a man with twisting horns and a man who looked totally human before his eyes flashed silver and he smiled at Lucy with sharp teeth.</p>
<p>All of them were demons. Well, not all of them, but the few humans present were covered in so much leather and dramatic make-up that they blended in perfectly. It definitely made the Shelter look like the safest place in Sunnydale. Not.</p>
<p>“Okay guys,” Sam said once they had finished setting up, “and girl, we are going to kill this.”</p>
<p>Lucy wished that he had used a different word.</p>
<p>Their set went pretty well, as far as Lucy could tell. People were dancing and no one threw anything at them. Lucy was able to fill the necessary gaps where the rhythm guitar was supposed to be, Soul quickly recovered when he nearly dropped one of his drumsticks and Oz actually smiled for realsies when they were done.</p>
<p>“Good job, guys,” Devon croaked. “I need water.”</p>
<p>“Go ahead, we’ll start packing up,” Soul told him.</p>
<p>The sight of a head of peroxide blond hair had Lucy stopping dead in her tracks before she even got close to the door. Sam walked into her from behind and she nearly dropped her borrowed guitar.</p>
<p>Sam’s bass guitar rattled in its case and he swore under his breath. “Man, what’s wrong with you?”</p>
<p>“Nothing,” Lucy said quickly. “I thought I saw someone.”</p>
<p>She started walking again. As they got closer to the door she held her breath, hoping. She thought that they had made it, but then the man sitting alone at the table closest to the door turned around and smiled. “Hello, kitten. Fancy meeting you here.”</p>
<p>Lucy swallowed. “Hello, Spike.”</p>
<p>Spike sipped his (not blood) drink. “Come here often?”</p>
<p>“You know this guy?” Sam asked quietly. Spike appeared to chuckle and Lucy knew that he had heard the question.</p>
<p>“He’s a friend of my cousin’s boyfriend,” she whispered back, despite whispering being useless.</p>
<p>Sam made a noise of understanding. “He’s hot, in a tortured bad boy sort of way. I’ll take your guitar if you want to talk.”</p>
<p>She didn’t really want to talk with Spike, but Lucy found herself handing over the guitar and moving out of the way so that Sam and the other guys could get through the door.</p>
<p>“You’ve been reading up,” Spike commented. “You haven’t actually met Peaches though. I don’t smell him on you.”</p>
<p>“That’s comforting,” Lucy said. “I wouldn’t want anyone to get the wrong idea.”</p>
<p>She actually heard Spike chuckle this time. “You know, I’m going to kill you no matter what, but I might actually sire you properly. It’d be a waste to just make you a minion.”</p>
<p>Lucy put a hand on her purse, but she couldn’t attack Spike here and he knew it.</p>
<p>“Remember the house rules, kitten. That bit of metal ‘round your wrist won’t protect you if you start anything.” He took another sip of his drink. “‘Sides, you’re no Slayer.”</p>
<p>That was painfully obvious.</p>
<p>Behind her, someone cleared their throat. “Is this guy bothering you, Lucy?” Devon asked.</p>
<p>“Just a difference of opinion, that’s all,” Lucy said, not taking her eyes off of Spike for a second. She wasn’t lying. It was a difference of opinion. She wanted to stay alive, he wanted her dead.</p>
<p>Devon stepped forwards like he was preparing to jump between Lucy and Spike. “We should go help with the drum kit.”</p>
<p>“Right,” Lucy said. “Goodbye, Spike.”</p>
<p>Spike raised his glass towards her. “Until next time.”</p>
<p>Lucy took a deep breath and turned her back on him.</p>
<p>Not freaking out until they were in Oz’s van and well away from the club was a minor miracle for Lucy. She was sitting in the back seat between Soul and Sam. Oz was the only one who didn’t bat an eye when she buried her face in her hands and started shaking.</p>
<p>“Lucy? Lucy! What’s wrong with her?” Soul exclaimed.</p>
<p>“What did that guy say to you?” Devon asked.</p>
<p>Lucy shook her head and took gulps of air. Her heart was racing. Her entire body was feeling the effects of a delayed urge to run away. Sam patted her back hesitantly.</p>
<p>“I’m okay,” she was able to say after a few moments. “I’m fine.” She had survived her second meeting with Spike. That was good. Now she just had to keep surviving.</p>
<p>And there was that human sacrifice to stop without letting anyone know that she was a mind-reader, but that could wait until tomorrow.</p>
  </div><div class="fff_chapter_notes fff_foot_notes"><b>Notes for the Chapter:</b><blockquote class="userstuff">
          <p>The composition of Dingoes Ate My Baby is based on Four Star Mary, the band whose music is used for the Dingoes. Since rhythm guitar is present for Four Star Mary but not mentioned in the BtVS wiki for the Dingoes, I decided that the Dingoes lost their rhythm guitarist in the show and that's why people in universe think they sound terrible (you know, when people do think they sound terrible).<br/>Also, Oz's full name doesn't look real. I checked, and I think it's spelled right but it still doesn't look right.</p>
        </blockquote></div></div>
<a name="section0006"><h2>6. Reptile Boy</h2></a>
<div class="story"><div class="userstuff module">
    
    <p>
  <strong>
    <em>Giles</em>
  </strong>
</p>
<p>Giles picked up the sword that he had been adding some runes to, things like strength and keeping an edge, and walked out of his office. The library, as usual, was completely empty. He looked at the doors. Buffy and her friends wouldn’t be out of class just yet.</p>
<p>He swung the sword, battling imaginary enemies. Yes, he knew it was childish, but he was a Watcher, he didn’t get to see much action.</p>
<p>“But what will you do if there’s a vampire behind you?” he narrated as he spun around and raised the sword above his head.</p>
<p>“Hey, Giles,” Buffy said.</p>
<p>Giles spun back around and tossed the sword onto a pile of rags in the cage, closing the door with his foot. “You four shouldn’t be creeping around like that. Someone might get hurt.” He hoped that none of them had seen him playing—no, <em>practising</em> with the sword.</p>
<p>Buffy’s cousin, Lucy, giggled.</p>
<p>“Uh, how did it go last night?” Giles asked.</p>
<p>Xander and Lucy went and sat on the checkout counter while Buffy held out a shiny thing. “Found this.”</p>
<p>Giles took the shiny thing and saw that it appeared to be part of a bracelet. He squinted at it. “E-N-T,” he read.</p>
<p>“I’ve seen something like that before,” Willow said. “I just don’t remember where.”</p>
<p>“It’s broken,” Buffy said. “There’s no telling what the rest of the letters were. And there’s blood on it.”</p>
<p>“Of course there’s blood on it,” Lucy muttered, just loud enough that Giles could easily hear her.</p>
<p>“I don’t see any,” he said, adjusting his glasses just in case that helped him make out some minuscule blood spot.</p>
<p>“Angel smelled it,” Buffy said.</p>
<p>“The blood?” Xander asked. “Now there’s a guy you want to party with.”</p>
<p>“Blood in Sunnydale. Raise your hand if you’re not surprised?” Willow said. She, Xander and Buffy immediately raised their hands, followed quickly by Lucy. Giles was quite inclined to join them.</p>
<p>“Oh, and speaking of vampires, it’s probably not connected but I ran into Spike last night,” Lucy said, “at the Shelter.”</p>
<p>Giles looked at her over his glasses. “The Shelter? That’s a demon club. What were you doing there?”</p>
<p>Lucy swung herself off of the counter. “Playing in the band.”</p>
<p>That was a reasonable answer. The Shelter was neutral ground, so even Buffy was supposed to be safe there. Lucy shouldn’t have had any problems...except Spike was there.</p>
<p>“Spike wants to sire her,” Buffy told Giles.</p>
<p>“I’m staying inside at night as much as possible for the foreseeable future,” Lucy said.</p>
<p>“Yes, that’s a good idea,” Giles said. As long as no one invited Spike in anywhere she would be, Lucy should be fine. But Giles resolved that if Lucy was sired Buffy wouldn’t be the one to stake her. They had already had to deal with consoling Xander when he had staked Jesse, and that was an accident. Giles didn’t want to imagine how Buffy would react to destroying her cousin’s body on purpose. He would stake Lucy himself if it came down to that.</p>
<p>Lucy flinched and jumped down from the counter. “Do we have a plan for the bracelet? Because I’ve got a biology quiz I want to study for.”</p>
<p>Giles held the bracelet closer to his eyes. “Ah, tonight Buffy will patrol and the rest of us will begin researching where this could have come from.”</p>
<p>“Great plan,” Xander said.</p>
<p>“No, not a great plan,” Buffy said. “I have plans.”</p>
<p>“Angel could go with her,” Lucy suggested. “Maybe he can play bloodhound.”</p>
<p>Giles briefly looked up from the bracelet. “Good idea.”</p>
<p>“Not a good idea,” Buffy said. “No, wait, that’s actually a good idea. But I’m not patrolling tonight!”</p>
<p>Giles frowned. “Why ever not?”</p>
<p>“Well, my mom isn’t feeling well and Lucy had band practice so I was going to look after her,” Buffy said slowly.</p>
<p>Giles looked at Lucy to corroborate the story.</p>
<p>Lucy scoffed and shook her head. “I’m not backing you on this one, Buffy. You want to go to that party? Fine. Maybe you’ll find something there.”</p>
<p>“What party?” Giles asked. “You had the night off on Sunday.”</p>
<p>“Cordelia and Buffy got invited to a party that the Delta Zeta Kappas are throwing and Buffy wants to go because she’s mad at Angel,” Xander explained. “I approve of the at-Angel-anger, by the way. You just need a better way to work it out.”</p>
<p>“Buffy!” Giles scolded.</p>
<p>Buffy crossed her arms. “Can’t a girl have a little fun?”</p>
<p>“You are no ordinary girl, you are the Slayer and we have possible demon activity that needs to be investigated.” Giles shook the bracelet in front of Buffy’s face.</p>
<p>“Hey, why do you think Buffy might find something at the party?” Willow asked Lucy, interrupting what was sure to turn into an argument.</p>
<p>“Uh...well, where did you find the bracelet?” Lucy asked.</p>
<p>“Graveyard,” Buffy said.</p>
<p>Lucy went over to the computer and turned the infernal device on. “Well, yeah, but which one? Uh, Willow? Can you help me with this?”</p>
<p>“Sure.” Willow took Lucy’s place in front of the computer.</p>
<p>“Sunnydale Cemetery,” Buffy said. “You know, the big one?”</p>
<p>“That...is a little less helpful,” Lucy said. She leaned on the back of Willow’s chair and looked over the other girl’s shoulder. “Can you get a map of Sunnydale and the location of the frat house?”</p>
<p>“No problem,” Willow said.</p>
<p>“I have maps,” Giles protested. “And an address book.”</p>
<p>“This is easier,” Lucy said. Giles looked at her, completely flabbergasted. How could that machine be easier to use than a map? Lucy wasn’t even the one doing the work!</p>
<p>The teenagers crowded around the computer. “The frat house is here,” Willow said, pointing at a spot on the monitor. “And Buffy found the bracelet...”</p>
<p>Buffy pointed it out. “Here, near the parking lot.”</p>
<p>“That’s pretty close to the frat house,” Xander said.</p>
<p>Giles decided to stop moping and went to join them so he could see what they were talking about.</p>
<p>“So,” Lucy said, “someone, probably a girl, runs out of the frat house, jumps the wall and runs through the cemetery.” She traced the path out on the map. “She’s bleeding and her bracelet got damaged so it falls off here,” she tapped the spot in the cemetery where Buffy had found the bracelet, “and that’s where we lose her.”</p>
<p>Giles took off his glasses. “So, where did she go from there?”</p>
<p>“Demon grabbed her?” Xander suggested.</p>
<p>“Oh! What about a magical portal that transported her to an alternate dimension where everyone wears funny hats?” Willow said.</p>
<p>“That is called England, Wil,” Xander said with a grin. Giles couldn’t ignore him, but since he was standing behind the teenagers he was able to roll his eyes without anyone noticing.   </p>
<p>“The real question is what was she running from?” Buffy said.</p>
<p>Giles pursed his lips. “Quite.”</p>
<p>They decided that Buffy would scout out the party with Xander and Angel standing by as back-up while Giles, Willow and Lucy did research. Giles would also ask Angel to try tracking the girl from where Buffy found her bracelet.</p>
<p>When the research group reconvened in the library after school, Lucy immediately headed towards the cage. “You guys keep weapons in here, right?”</p>
<p>“Oh, well, yes,” Giles said. “May I ask why?”</p>
<p>Lucy shrugged. “I’ve got a bad feeling, that’s all. We need to be prepared. Is there any weapon I can learn to use in the next four hours that can skin a snake?”</p>
<p>Giles blinked. “What on earth do you mean by skin a snake?”</p>
<p>Lucy shook her head. “It’s just a saying—a Frisco thing—it doesn’t matter. Willow’s on computer and we’re hitting the books?”</p>
<p>“Yes,” Giles said. He handed Lucy a spell book, one of the few he had in English.  “Look for tracking spells.” Lucy nodded and took a seat across from Willow.</p>
<p>Willow asked for the bracelet and Giles went and retrieved it from his office. Then Willow did something that allowed her to search for only locations in the Sunnydale area after she attempted to fill in the missing letters.</p>
<p>“I’m pretty sure it’s a place,” she insisted when “bent”, “rent” and “tent” failed to turn up viable options.</p>
<p>“How do you know it’s not more than four letters?” Giles asked.</p>
<p>“The bracelet’s too small,” Willow said. “See the length of the chain?”</p>
<p>“Try ‘Kent’,” Lucy suggested. “Like Superman’s name.”</p>
<p>Willow typed it out. “That’s it, ‘Kent’! I knew I saw these bracelets somewhere before, the girls at Kent Preparatory School all wear them.”</p>
<p>“Where’s that?” Lucy asked.</p>
<p>“Just outside of town,” Willow said. She was typing furiously. “I’m pulling up their school newsletter to see if there’s anything about...oh.”</p>
<p>Giles looked over her shoulder and saw the smiling face of a girl looking out from the screen. “A missing girl.”</p>
<p>Lucy closed her book and went to stand next to Giles. “Missing for over a week, Callie Megan Anderson.”</p>
<p>“No one’s seen her and no one knows what happened to her.” Giles took off his glasses and began cleaning the lenses.</p>
<p>“This being Sunnydale and all, I’m guessing we can rule out anything good,” Willow said.</p>
<p>“Are we calling in the cavalry?” Lucy asked.</p>
<p>“I do believe that would be wise,” Giles said. “Especially since-”</p>
<p>“There are more,” Willow interrupted. “Brittany Oswald, junior at St. Michael’s. Kelly Percell, sophomore at Grant. They both disappeared a year ago, almost to the day.”</p>
<p>“Some kind of ritual?” Lucy suggested.</p>
<p>“Yes, or perhaps an anniversary of some kind with some significance to the killer,” Giles mused.</p>
<p>Willow gulped. “Killer? There’s a killer now?”</p>
<p>“Well, this being Sunnydale and all,” Giles said.</p>
<p>Lucy closed her book. “The only tracking spell I’ve found needs more blood than what’s on that bracelet. Can’t we just go storm the castle?”</p>
<p>Giles shook his head. They didn’t know what they were up against and if Buffy was otherwise tied up they could very well get themselves killed.</p>
<p>The blood suddenly drained from Lucy’s face. “This thing, it’s taking high school girls, isn’t it?”</p>
<p>“Well, yeah,” Willow said. “But...oh no.”</p>
<p>Giles quickly realized what the girls were thinking of, or rather, <em>who </em>they were thinking of.</p>
<p>“Buffy!”</p>
<p>It took seconds for the three of them to run out of the library loaded down with swords, axes, and crossbows. The second after that the phone in the library rang. Giles cursed and ran back in to answer it. “What is it?”</p>
<p>“Giles,” Xander gasped, “something’s happened to Buffy-”</p>
<p>“We’re already on our way. Wait for us,” Giles said in a rush before slamming the phone down and running after the girls.</p>
<hr/>
<p>By the time they got to the frat house, Xander and Angel were halfway up the driveway. The two of them seemed to be alternating who wanted to go charging into the house and who was holding the other back.</p>
<p>“Weapons,” Willow said, handing an axe to Xander. “And Angel, Lucy; Lucy, Angel.”</p>
<p>“Talk to you later if we survive this,” Lucy said to the vampire. Angel nodded.</p>
<p>“Can we go in now?” Xander asked.</p>
<p>Less than a second after Giles gave the okay, Angel had broken the door down and knocked out the two fraternity boys on the main floor.</p>
<p>“They’re in the basement!” Xander said as he ran for the stairs. He was intercepted by three more fraternity boys wearing brown, hooded robes. He swung his battle-axe like a baseball bat, hitting one of the boys on the side of the head and sending him tumbling back down the stairs. A few more hits from Xander and Angel and the stairs to the basement were cleared. The whole group was about to run downstairs when more fraternity boys came running up.</p>
<p>“How many of them are there?” Lucy shouted as she hit one in the chest with her mace.</p>
<p>Willow ducked around the fraternity boys and ran into the basement. After a second she came back out. “There’s a guy attacking Buffy with a sword and a snake, a really big snake!”</p>
<p>Angel punched one of the fraternity boys towards Giles, who beat him with the flat of his sword. Out of the corner of his eye, Giles saw that Xander had abandoned his axe and was piggyback riding another fraternity boy while punching him repeatedly. Lucy swung her mace at the arm of the fraternity boy she was fighting and Giles swore he heard the bone snap. If the fraternity boy had known that Giles had stopped Lucy from taking a spiked mace he would have been very thankful.</p>
<p>“Guys! Buffy! Snake! Basement! Now!” Willow yelled.</p>
<p>With all the fraternity boys taken out, the five of them had no trouble running downstairs. There was a crash as Buffy threw a fraternity boy dressed in green into a table, then she grabbed a sword from the ground and went for the giant snake demon.</p>
<p>Cordelia was screaming as the demon reached for her. Buffy interrupted it with a decisive chop to what Giles assumed was its midsection. As quite a bit of the demon was still down the well by the stairs he couldn’t be sure exactly how large it was. The demon let out a scream as it died that was a higher pitch than Cordelia’s.</p>
<p>“Ow,” Lucy murmured, clasping her hands over her ears.</p>
<p>Buffy dropped the sword, the chains hanging from her wrists rattling. “Well, that’s that.”</p>
<p>“You saved me!” Cordelia launched herself at Angel and gave him a hug. Angel looked at Giles over her head with a bewildered look on his face. Giles just shrugged.</p>
<p>After the others had gone back upstairs, taking Callie Anderson and the green-robed fraternity boy with them, Buffy looked at Giles sheepishly. “I had one drink, one ordinary-girl-at-a-party drink.”</p>
<p>“And you were nearly devoured by a giant snake demon,” Giles said. “Buffy, you are no ordinary girl. Can you imagine what would have happened if Lucy had allowed you to go through with your lie? We may never have known what killed you.”</p>
<p>“I handled it,” Buffy said. “But...I guess you’re right. This is Sunnydale, nothing here is ever ordinary.”</p>
<p>“Quite,” Giles agreed. “I do think we may mange to schedule in ordinary time for ‘fun’ though.” Buffy smiled at him. Giles smiled back. “Now, I do believe Willow and Lucy planned to chastise Angel after this was all over. I suggest we catch up with them before they have a chance to tear him to pieces.”</p>
  </div></div>
<a name="section0007"><h2>7. Tea Party</h2></a>
<div class="story"><div class="userstuff module">
    
    <p>
  <strong>
    <em>Lucy</em>
  </strong>
</p>
<p>Angel volunteered to walk Buffy and Lucy home after the demon snake boy fiasco. He spent the walk fussing over Buffy as subtly as possible and scanning the area around them for threats. Lucy lagged a little behind the couple, making sure that she was still close enough that they would hear any squeak she made, just in case.</p>
<p>They made it home without any trouble. Lucy said goodbye to Angel and went inside first to give him and Buffy privacy for a goodnight kiss. She and Willow had already torn into Angel with a varied combination of threats, so leaving them alone was the least she could do. Well, Willow had yelled at him about being immortal and yet not having time for a cup of coffee, which wasn’t really a threat and was also impossible for Lucy to follow up. She’d just muttered something about no one finding the body, which was kind of obvious given the whole vampire thing.</p>
<p>Aunt Joy was reading in the living room went Lucy came in. “How did your studying go?” she asked.</p>
<p>“It went well,” Lucy said. “Really well. Buffy’s just outside talking to Angel about...something.”</p>
<p>Aunt Joy nodded. “Oh, a boy came by to see you. He brought a letter. I left it on the table.”</p>
<p>Lucy looked and saw a white envelope sitting on the dining room table. “Thanks, Aunt Joy. Did he say who he was?” The only boys she could see leaving her a letter were Oz and Soul.</p>
<p>She went over and opened the envelope. A white card with a little spray of daises on the font fell out.</p>
<p>“William,” Aunt Joy said. “Is he from school? He looked a lot older than you.”</p>
<p>Lucy opened the card. Written in elegant script it said, <em>You are invited to Drusilla’s tea party tomorrow night. I’ll come fetch you. Don’t be late. Don’t tell the Slayer.</em> It was unsigned, but Lucy knew who it was from.</p>
<p>The door opened and Buffy came in with a smile on her face. She took one look at Lucy and her face fell. “What’s wrong?”</p>
<p>“Did he come inside, Aunt Joy?” Lucy demanded. “Was he in the house?”</p>
<p>Aunt Joy looked confused. “Yes, we had coffee before he went home. Why?”</p>
<p>“Because he...he was supposed to be helping us with English and then he didn’t show,” Lucy lied. “Angel is really mad at him.”</p>
<p>“Angel is mad at who?” Buffy asked. “Did I miss something?”</p>
<p>“William, you know, tall, bleach blond, met him at the Bronze?” Lucy said, willing Buffy to figure out who she was talking about. “Cockney accent, likes black.”</p>
<p>Buffy’s eyes finally widened. “Oh, yeah, but Angel wasn’t as mad as you were.”</p>
<p>“I have an essay,” Lucy grumbled when Aunt Joy looked at her questioningly. She held up the card. “William apologizes for not being there, he had to look after his sister. I’m going to bed. Goodnight.”</p>
<p>“Goodnight?” Aunt Joy said with confusion as Lucy ran up the stairs.</p>
<p>After a few minutes, Buffy opened the door of her bedroom and poked her head in. Lucy had already hidden the message from Spike under her mattress and was sitting on top of it while she pulled her pajama top over her head. Buffy came in and closed the door behind her.</p>
<p>“So, what did Spike actually write?” Buffy asked while Lucy wrestled with her top. “And oh my God, where did you get that scar?”</p>
<p>Lucy squeaked into the fabric over her face. “What scar?”</p>
<p>“The one over your ribs,” Buffy said. “Looks old enough to not be from anything in Sunnydale, looks new enough to be from something last year?”</p>
<p>Lucy finally got herself untangled from her pajama top. She fixed her eyes on Buffy. “It’s personal.”</p>
<p>“Okay,” Buffy said slowly. She sat down on her bed. “What about the card?”</p>
<p>Lucy squeezed her eyes shut. Buffy wasn’t going to like this. “I can’t tell you.”</p>
<p>After a few moments of silence Lucy opened her eyes and saw Buffy looking at her with something between a frown and a pout. “Why can’t you tell me?” Buffy demanded.</p>
<p>“Because I can’t tell you,” Lucy said. “Look, Spike can get in here now. He will kill your mom if I don’t do what he says and that means I can’t tell you what he said!”</p>
<p>The two girls looked at each other. Lucy sighed. “The scar is from a surgery, a lobectomy. Have Willow help you look it up, but don’t tell Xander or Mr. Giles. I’ll take care of this Spike thing, promise.”</p>
<p>Buffy pressed her lips into a thin line. “You’ll be careful?”</p>
<p>“Of course,” Lucy said softly. She cracked a smile. “It’s my middle name.”</p>
<p>Buffy frowned. “I thought your middle name was Kathleen.”</p>
<p>Lucy laughed. “You need to go to sleep.”</p>
<p>Buffy joined her in chuckling. “Yeah, I do.” She stood up and stretched. “I’m going to take a shower. Don’t wait up.”</p>
<p>“Not a chance,” Lucy said. “I’m exhausted.”</p>
<p>Buffy smirked. “You get used to it. Goodnight.”</p>
<p>“Night.”</p>
<p>Lucy waited until she heard the water running before getting up and going over to the window that faced the side of the house. She looked through her reflection in the glass into the darkness. “I know you’re out there,” she said. “Go home, Drusilla. Go back to Spike and tell him I got his message.”</p>
<p>She heard the faint sound of a girlish giggle. A weight lifted from her mind and she knew that Drusilla was gone.</p>
<p>Buffy got more sleep than Lucy that night, but between her nightmares and Lucy’s worry it was a close race. The bleed over from Buffy’s dreams into Lucy’s head was what cinched it. Lucy basically sleepwalked through school, only surfacing for biology class and lunch with the band. Since there wasn’t any new supernatural activity that needed researching, Lucy planned to go straight home and take a nap before going to her probable death. Getting cornered at her locker by Buffy and Willow put an end to those plans.</p>
<p>Lucy looked from Buffy’s face to Willow’s and bit back a groan. “I’m guessing you want to talk?”</p>
<p>Willow nodded. “Yes please.”</p>
<p>Lucy piled the rest of her textbooks into her locker and then they went to commandeer a girls’ washroom. Buffy checked that no one was inside before locking the door. They stood in silence for a few moments before Buffy spoke. “You had lung cancer.”</p>
<p>It was framed as a statement, not a question. Lucy looked at Willow. “You did some extra research?”</p>
<p>“Well, yeah,” Willow said. “We kind of wanted to know why you had to take out part of your lung and the websites and papers and stuff I found said that it was a treatment for lung cancer and you should be able to exercise normally after six months, which is good because, hello, Sunnydale, we have to do a lot of running away from demons and slaying demons but it’s usually Buffy who does the slaying and the rest of us run away. Oh, that’s why you were in the hospital last year!”</p>
<p>Lucy blinked. She had never been treated to quite that much Willow-babble. It took her brain a little while to catch up, but once it did she asked, “You hacked into the hospital records, didn’t you?”</p>
<p>Willow blushed. “Maybe. Probably. Yeah.”</p>
<p>Well, there had to be a reason that Buffy had thought of her as Hacker Girl more than once.</p>
<p>“Get me everything you can find on Dr. Marcel Capson and I’ll pretend I didn’t hear that,” Lucy said.</p>
<p>“Deal,” Willow said with frantic nods.      </p>
<p>Buffy shook her head. “Okay, everybody stop. What is happening? Why did you tell us to look this up?”</p>
<p>Because she felt bad about not being able to tell Buffy what Spike wanted. Because she had to give her something. Because Buffy and Willow were part of her new family. Because...</p>
<p>“It’s one less secret that I have to keep from you,” Lucy said quietly.</p>
<p>“Oh,” Buffy said. “Hugs?”</p>
<p>Yes, hugs. Hugs were good.</p>
<hr/>
<p>Lucy was on high alert as soon as the sun set. She had her mind wide open and was sure she was on the way to getting a headache despite the preemptive painkiller she had taken, but it was worth it when she heard Spike coming towards the house. His mind would have been unmistakable even if he hadn’t been remembering when he and Angelus had beheaded people with wires.      </p>
<p>Lucy took a few deep breaths to calm herself and touched the cross around her neck. Buffy noticed. <em>She’s totally freaked, </em>she thought. <em>I don’t like this.</em> Lucy didn’t like it either.</p>
<p>The doorbell rang just as she put away the last of the dishes that Buffy had dried. “I’ll get it,” Lucy said immediately.</p>
<p>“I’m closer,” Buffy said. She was by the sink, which was further away from the front door than the cupboard Lucy had just closed.</p>
<p>“I’m closer,” Lucy argued.</p>
<p>Aunt Joy dried her hands on a dishtowel. “You girls are being silly. <em>I’ll </em>get it.”</p>
<p>“I have a bad feeling about this,” Buffy murmured as soon as Aunt Joy left the kitchen. “Come on.”</p>
<p>Lucy was half a step behind Buffy as they followed Aunt Joy to the door. Buffy planned to be close enough to push Aunt Joy behind her if she needed to and Lucy wasn’t going to leave them alone with Spike. Aunt Joy didn’t acknowledge that they had followed her, but Lucy could hear her amusement.</p>
<p>Unorganized anger reigned in Buffy’s mind in the seconds after the door opened. Lucy took a few steps back, which caused Spike to smile at her because he thought she was reacting to seeing him.</p>
<p>“William,” Aunt Joy exclaimed. “I didn’t expect to see you here.”</p>
<p>“Considering how he bailed on us last night he shouldn’t be showing his face anywhere,” Buffy spat out without stuttering even a little over their cover story.</p>
<p>“I know you needed to watch your sister,” Lucy said quickly before Spike could say anything that contradicted Buffy, “but you could have called.” <em>Please play along. </em>She tried to convey her plea through empathetic eye movements and mouthing the words.</p>
<p>Spike played along. “That’s why I’m here. Me mum and I, we both need to be places tonight. I was hoping Lucy would babysit.”</p>
<p>Lucy scoffed. “After what you did last night? I don’t appreciate being...stood up.” She had been going to say that she didn’t appreciate being threatened but managed to change her words at the last second.</p>
<p>“Well, I can come in,” Spike suggested with a totally innocent look on his face, “and we can talk about it.”</p>
<p>“No,” Buffy said flatly. “Get lost.”</p>
<p>“Buffy!” Aunt Joy chided.</p>
<p>Lucy looked at Spike. He was planning how he would kill Aunt Joy if Lucy refused to go with him. It wouldn’t be quick or painless, and he was looking forward to it. It made him happy.</p>
<p>“Just let me get my purse,” Lucy said.</p>
<p>Spike smiled. No, he smirked. “Of course.”</p>
<p>It wasn’t cold outside but Lucy still had a hard time stopping herself from shivering as she walked with Spike to the abandon factory where he and Drusilla were living. She tried to convince herself that she wasn’t scared. It was almost like walking around San Francisco at night except she was doing ten times as much scanning for threats as she would in the city, which made it nearly impossible to convince herself that she wasn’t scared.</p>
<p>“Nice night,” Spike said.</p>
<p>Lucy scoffed. “Don’t try to make small talk.”</p>
<p>“Why not?” Spike smiled. “The sun’s set, there’s a beautiful full moon and I’m walking with a pretty girl.”</p>
<p>“Who you’re going to kill as soon as she becomes inconvenient,” Lucy tacked on. “And I’m not pretty.” Not the way he was saying it, where it meant “weak” and “biddable” and “nonthreatening”.</p>
<p>Spike looked at her and shrugged. “Well, you’re not ugly.”</p>
<p>“Thanks,” Lucy said flatly. “Do me a favour and try to be nicer when you kill me.”</p>
<p>Every vampire on the ground floor of the factory noticed when Spike walked in with a conscious, unrestrained human. Almost every mind was filled with surprise for at least a few seconds. There weren’t as many vampires in the factory as there had been last time Lucy was there. She guessed that most of them were out hunting and then promptly tried to forget that she had thought that.</p>
<p>The only vampire that wasn’t surprised at all by Lucy’s arrival was Drusilla. She looked up from the old-fashioned, red haired china doll she was walking across the long, narrow table in the centre of the room and smiled slowly. “You brought her!”</p>
<p>The bones in Lucy’s wrist flexed as Spike grabbed it and marched her towards Drusilla, as if she was going to try to run away now.</p>
<p>“Well, there’s nothing I won’t get for my princess.” Spike smiled. “You two have fun. I’ve got books to find.” He turned away for a second before turning back. “Oh, and kitten? You hurt her, I’ll kill you.” He smiled at Lucy and left the factory.</p>
<p>“I guessed that,” Lucy muttered.</p>
<p>Drusilla clapped her hands together. “We’re having a tea party,” she said in a sing-songy voice that made her cockney accent sound even more dramatic than it already was. “Twila told me you like chocolate. Pretty dolly.”</p>
<p>Lucy looked at the doll Drusilla had left on the table. It seemed to wink at her. “Yeah. Tea. Chocolate.”</p>
<p>“Blood, drip, drip, drip, and the white knight dies,” Drusilla said with delight. Lucy didn’t even want to try to figure out what she was thinking. Drusilla’s mind was a whirlwind of blood and tears.</p>
<p>Tea was served in a corner of the factory at a child-sized plastic table draped with a lacy shawl for a tablecloth. The other vampires gave them a wide berth while Drusilla poured Lucy, Twila the doll and another china doll with a strip of red fabric tied over her mouth cups of blood from a flower patterned tea pot. Lucy was going to have to find some way to switch the cups because she was certain that the vampire would make a dangerous fuss if she didn’t drink.</p>
<p>“Miss Edith would like a biscuit,” Drusilla said to the gagged doll. “Shush, Miss Edith. Our guest must have first.”</p>
<p>Drusilla held out a plate of Oreo cookies and Lucy took one automatically. She didn’t know what she was going to do with it but she definitely wasn’t going to eat it. When Drusilla wasn’t looking she broke the cookie in half and slipped one half into her pocket. The other half followed after a few minutes. The next cookie that Drusilla gave her went into her other pocket. If she made it through the night alive doing a bit of laundry wouldn’t kill her.</p>
<p>The rest of the tea party went on like that. Lucy managed to get away with pretending to drink the blood while she cobbled together replies to Drusilla’s often nonsensical sentences. Drusilla didn’t kill her, which she took as a good sign.</p>
<p>Lucy heard as soon as Spike got close to the factory. His thoughts were so loud that the headache crossing her eyes from temple to temple practically doubled in intensity. He was very pleased with himself. Impulsively, Lucy wanted to see if she could rattle him. Definitely not the best idea. Maybe Drusilla’s insanity was rubbing off on her.</p>
<p>“Spike,” Lucy called with a smile. “You’re back!”</p>
<p>Spike’s head shot up as he looked away from the books some of the other vampires had placed on the long table and towards Lucy and Drusilla. He nearly hit his forehead on one of the high-backed chairs around the table. <em>Bloody hell</em>, he thought.</p>
<p>“Do you want some tea?” Lucy asked, holding up her full cup.</p>
<p>Spike shook his head but stalked over and took the cup from Lucy. <em>There’s something wrong with this girl</em>, he thought as he drained it. Lucy decided to take that as a win.</p>
<p>“The stars are happy,” Drusilla said. “Are you happy?”</p>
<p>“Extremely, my sweet.” Spike bent to give her a kiss.</p>
<p>“Did you rob a bookstore?” Lucy asked.</p>
<p>Spike looked at her. “Museum,” he deadpanned. “Drusilla, darling, I’ve got to get our guest home. We don’t want the Slayer to worry about her.”</p>
<p>Drusilla nodded. “She won’t die tonight.”</p>
<p>Lucy wasn’t sure if Drusilla was talking about her or Buffy.</p>
<p>Spike grabbed her arm and pulled her out of the building. As soon as they were outside she tried to shake him off. “I can walk on my own.”</p>
<p>“Of course you can.” Spike scoffed. “You know, I haven’t had anyone to eat tonight. How’s about a quick bite, kitten?”</p>
<p>Lucy tried to back away from him as much as she could while he was still holding on to her arm. He slammed her back into the factory’s wall, knocking the wind out of her, and shifted into his demon face. In a second her scarf was pulled off of her skin and Spike’s fangs pierced her neck.</p>
<p>Lucy gasped. She hadn’t been awake when Drusilla bit her so she didn’t know what to brace for. The stabbing pain that she felt was far worse than any needle or medical test she’d ever experienced. Her heart beat a frantic tattoo in her chest. Moments after Spike noticed that (and how she was able to keep track of his thoughts right then she didn’t know) the pain was replaced by intense, terrible pleasure that filled her body with warmth. The need to struggle disappeared.</p>
<p>When Spike stopped drinking, Lucy gripped his arm so she wouldn’t fall to the ground. She was lightheaded and her legs were like Jell-O. Spike had half dragged her a few blocks before she was able to speak.</p>
<p>“Stop,” she said quietly. Spike kept moving. Lucy hadn’t expected him to even acknowledge her, but later she rationalized that after all the stress he had been putting her through not listening to her was enough to make her snap.</p>
<p>“I said stop!” Lucy yanked her body away from Spike and planted her feet firmly on the ground. Unfortunately, the effect was ruined by her vision going spotty and her legs collapsing under her. She reached out for the cemetery wall next to her and only succeeded in scraping her hand against the brick.</p>
<p>Spike let out a curse and caught her. “Don’t be a bloody fool! Do you want me to break your neck?”</p>
<p>“Stop threatening me,” Lucy said forcefully. “We both know you won’t kill me without Drusilla’s permission, so just stop. You’re embarrassing yourself.”</p>
<p>Spike growled and his eyes flashed yellow. “Haven’t you heard it’s easier to ask for forgiveness then permission, luv?”</p>
<p>Lucy grabbed his forearms and hauled herself to her feet. She looked him straight in the eyes. “Spike, let’s make a deal.”</p>
<p>Spike’s eyes narrowed. “Go on.”</p>
<p>“I saw you with Drusilla,” Lucy said. “You worry about her, but you can’t always stay with her. I can <em>willingly</em> babysit for you if you stop threatening my life and don’t hurt or kill my aunt.”</p>
<p>Spike scoffed. “You’re only a human. If Dru wants to do something you won’t be able to stop her. Try again.”</p>
<p>Lucy wracked her mind to try to remember anything she heard in Spike’s thoughts that could be useful. “In exchange for my aunt’s life, I will do whatever you ask of me, within reason. I will not give you information about Buffy and her friends or be used against them in any way. In return I will not give them your secrets. You will not harm my aunt in any way and you will not kill her.”</p>
<p>There was a silence as Spike thought through her proposal. “What about the Slayer?” he asked.</p>
<p>“I know I can’t stop you from going after her,” Lucy said. “Just...please don’t kill her or try to kill her in front of me.”</p>
<p><em>You’re a strange girl, kitten,</em> Spike thought. Out loud he said, “We have a deal. You can let go of me now.”</p>
<p>Lucy looked down at their intertwined arms. “I don’t think I can.”</p>
<p>“What? Why?” Spike asked.</p>
<p>“I’m pretty sure if I let go I’ll fall again,” Lucy said. “And my head feels like it’s about to split open.” It was pure self-preservation that stopped her from slamming her mental doors shut, despite the headache.</p>
<p>“Ah,” Spike said. “Well, lean on me and we’ll think up a lie while we get you home, alright?” He shifted his grip until he had one arm around her waist to hold her up and the other crossing in front of him so that she could hold his wrist with one hand.</p>
<p>“Alright,” Lucy agreed. “But don’t think this makes us friends.”</p>
<p>Spike scoffed. “Of course not. I’m not an idiot. Let’s go.”</p>
  </div></div>
<a name="section0008"><h2>8. Doll Night</h2></a>
<div class="story"><div class="userstuff module">
    
    <p>
  <strong>
    <em>Buffy</em>
  </strong>
</p>
<p>The hallway was pitch black when Buffy opened her bedroom door. She took a step over the threshold and was immediately tumbling down the stairs to the front door. She lay at the foot of the stairs for a moment before she heard whispering. When she sat up the whispering got louder and she was able to make out words.</p>
<p><em>“Slayer,”</em> a woman said in a sing-songy tone. <em>“Slayer. Where you hiding?” </em></p>
<p>Come to think of it, hiding sounded like a good idea.</p>
<p>Buffy pushed herself to her feet. They couldn’t keep weapons downstairs since her mom didn’t know she was the Slayer, so her only choice if she wanted to be prepared for a fight was to go get some from her room. As she turned to go back up the stairs, there was a knock on the door.</p>
<p>Mom appeared suddenly on the bottom step. “I’ll get it,” she said.</p>
<p>“No, wait! Mom!” Buffy tried to stop her mom from walking past her but she slipped through her grasp. The door was opened and a strong wind blew Buffy off of her feet.</p>
<p>Suddenly, Buffy was in the basement under the stairs. There was a loud thump from the floor above, like someone had fallen hard, and dust rained down around her. She heard the door to the basement open and close. There were footsteps on the stairs but she couldn’t see who they belonged to.</p>
<p><em>“Where are you, Slayer?” </em>the same woman as before called. <em>“I won’t hurt you.”</em></p>
<p>Buffy looked carefully around the stairs to see who was there. In the dim light she managed to make out red hair and a dark dress on a figure standing with her back to her.</p>
<p>“Willow?” Buffy whispered.</p>
<p> The figure turned. It wasn’t Willow. This redhead was a young woman with a doll-like face and pretty blue eyes.</p>
<p>
  <em>“I want your blood!”</em>
</p>
<p>The woman screamed and lunged at Buffy with a mouth full of sharp teeth.</p>
<hr/>
<p>Buffy woke up with a gasp. She reached for her throat, not quite believing that the attack had been a dream. Once she had convinced herself that she was all in one piece, she reached out of her bed and turned on the light so that she could check the time. Lucy rolled over in her own bed but didn’t wake up.</p>
<p>The alarm clock that Lucy had brought with her showed the time as nearly five in the morning. It was too late for Buffy to go on out a patrol to try to distract herself. All the bad little demons would already be in bed.</p>
<p>It was Saturday so there wasn’t really any reason for her to try very hard to get back to sleep, even with the exhibit opening at Mom’s gallery later that she and Lucy had promised they’d go to. That meant that she ending up lying awake with her nightmare playing over and over again in her mind until Lucy gave a choked scream. Buffy immediately looked over at her and saw that her cousin was now also wide awake. She fought her way out of the bedsheets she’d gotten tangled in and sat straight up. She and Buffy looked at each other for a long moment.</p>
<p>Buffy sat up. “Nightmares?”</p>
<p>Lucy nodded. “You too?”</p>
<p>“Yup,” Buffy said. “Want to talk about it?”</p>
<p>“Wasn’t I supposed to say that?” Lucy hugged her knees and frowned, looking down at her bedsheets. “It’s stupid.”</p>
<p>“Can’t be as stupid as making a deal with a vampire,” Buffy said. Lucy had told her about that after she had come home with Spike last week spouting a story about falling down the stairs but don’t worry she was fine. She had managed to get to her bed before passing out from blood loss. Once she woke up they’d had a one sided argument about telling Willow, Xander and Giles that wasn’t actually an argument because they both wanted the others to know.</p>
<p>Xander and Giles hadn’t been happy.    </p>
<p>Lucy rolled her eyes. “Would you give it a rest already? He promised not to hurt your mom, that’s all I cared about.”</p>
<p>“Yeah, yeah.” Buffy gave her a sad smile. “Your heart was in the right place.”</p>
<p>“So we can move on? Good.” Lucy yawned. “Maybe we should try to get back to sleep.”</p>
<p>Buffy frowned. “Don’t think I’m going to be able to sleep.”</p>
<p>“That bad?” Lucy asked.</p>
<p>Buffy described her dream. Lucy grimaced. “Have you had dreams like that before?”</p>
<p>“No,” Buffy said. “Yes. In September when the Master was almost brought back from deader than dead, I dreamed about it before it happened.”</p>
<p>“Do you think it’s like a Slayer power?” Lucy suggested. “Getting visions of future enemies.”</p>
<p>Buffy shrugged. “I think it’s supposed to be. Giles would probably know.” He had to have done more reading on it after what happened with the Anointed One’s plan to revive the Master. He was Giles after all.</p>
<p>“Useful skill,” Lucy said. “Better than being a human juice box for a Billy Idol wannabe.”</p>
<p>“Oh, believe me, vampires would love to get a bite out of the Slayer.” Buffy mimicked the way that Lucy was sitting. “What about your nightmare?”</p>
<p>Lucy scoffed. “It is so stupid. Angel and Spike fighting over a doll.”</p>
<p>Buffy laughed. “What?”</p>
<p>“Exactly what it sounds like,” Lucy said. “Angel and Spike were fighting over a doll and I was trying to stop them.”</p>
<p>“That can’t be it,” Buffy said. “Unless the doll was totally terrifying.”</p>
<p>Lucy nodded. “It was. China doll, dead eyes, the works. But...then Spike killed Angel. And he turned me into a vampire. I dug myself out of my grave and you were there with a stake, and then Spike was behind you and he broke your neck. That was when I woke up.”</p>
<p>“Oh,” Buffy said. “Well, I’m here. Not dead. And you’re here not dead too.”</p>
<p>“Yeah,” Lucy said. “That wasn’t the scariest part. I mean, it was scariest but not scariest scariest, you know?”</p>
<p>Buffy nodded. She knew exactly what Lucy meant. “Do you want to talk about the scariest scariest part?”</p>
<p>“Promise not to tell?” Lucy asked quietly.</p>
<p>Buffy crossed her heart. “Slayer’s honour.”</p>
<p>Lucy took a deep breath in. “Spike said he loved me.”</p>
<p>Buffy froze. “Oh.”</p>
<p>“I don’t know where it came from,” Lucy babbled. “I mean, all he’s ever done is hurt me and threaten me and threaten Aunt Joy and try to kill you and...and...”</p>
<p>Buffy got out of bed and went to sit next to Lucy. “He’s a horrible, murdering creature of the night with great cheekbones.”</p>
<p>Lucy burst out laughing. “That’s nothing! Have you seen his eyes? When he’s not vamped out I mean. And when he’s not threatening people he’s actually really sweet.”</p>
<p>Buffy elbowed her gently. “Hey, there’s only room for one vampire boyfriend in this family.”</p>
<p>Lucy smiled. “Yes, ma’am.” Then she yawned. “Okay, now I have to go back to sleep. I might not have had my blood drained last night, but I was still at Spike’s till late.”</p>
<p>Buffy frowned. “I don’t remember that.”</p>
<p>Lucy shrugged. “You were asleep when I got home. Heavy night for slaying. You got five of Spike’s minions. He was really mad about it.”</p>
<p>“Cool,” Buffy said. She stood up. “Well, goodnight.”</p>
<p>Lucy didn’t answer. Buffy quickly turned around and saw that her cousin had already fallen back to sleep. She shook her head in disbelief.</p>
<p>After getting less than an hour more of sleep, Buffy bolted down breakfast and headed straight for Giles’s house. She knocked frantically on his door until he opened it, yawning.</p>
<p>“Buffy, it’s seven in the morning on a Saturday. Shouldn’t you still be asleep?”</p>
<p>Buffy pushed past him into the house. “No time. We need to find everything we can about red-haired women with shark teeth.”</p>
<p>“I beg your pardon?” Giles asked.</p>
<p>Buffy got halfway through explaining her dream when someone else knocked at Giles’s door. He opened it and Lucy marched in.</p>
<p>“Buffy, your mom is freaking out. You didn’t let her know you’d left and we have to go get dresses to wear for the opening tonight,” Lucy said. “Morning, Mr. Giles.”</p>
<p>“Good morning, Lucy,” Giles said. “Buffy, you go with Lucy and I’ll research this creature you saw in your dream.”</p>
<p>Buffy gave a sigh of relief. “Thanks, Giles. You’re the best.”</p>
<p>“Well, it wasn’t like I had anything else planned for today,” Giles muttered. “Do enjoy yourselves.”</p>
<p>“Bye,” Lucy said as she pushed Buffy out of the door.</p>
<hr/>
<p>Buffy and Lucy would have been the only people under thirty at the exhibit opening if Mom hadn’t given invitations to Willow and Xander too. The four of them were cornered at the drinks table by a man in a checkered suit who spent what felt like an hour talking about how nice it was to see young people interested in the fine arts and how it made him feel proud to be a patron of this gallery and many others like it. Escaping without causing a scene was impossible.</p>
<p>“Does he even know what this exhibit is for?” Willow asked once the man was finally gone.</p>
<p>“What is it for?” Buffy asked. She’d been kind of distracted.</p>
<p>“Graffiti,” Lucy said with a grin. “I’m not sure he’d classify spray paint as fine art.”</p>
<p>“I would call it highly unlikely,” Xander agreed.</p>
<p>They had enough time to catch their breath before Mom and another woman in a pink dress walked up to them.</p>
<p>“Hi, Mom,” Buffy said.</p>
<p>Mom smiled. “Hi, Buffy.” She looked at the woman with her. “Grace, this is my daughter Buffy, my niece Lucy, and Buffy’s friends Xander and Willow. Kids, this is Grace Kendall. Her daughter goes to school with you.”</p>
<p>“We’ve met,” Xander said. “She’s where Harmony gets her...blond hair and love of pink.”</p>
<p>Grace Kendall giggled. “You’re such a doll! Are you kids liking the exhibit? My sister is one of the artists!”</p>
<p>“It’s really cool, Mrs. Kendall,” Lucy said.</p>
<p>The smile on Grace Kendall’s face grew wider. Buffy wondered if she was actually a demon. That would explain how her face hadn’t split in half yet and Harmony’s...everything.</p>
<p>“Call me Grace, dear,” Mrs. Kendall told Lucy. “Have you seen <em>Fairydust</em>? It’s one of my favourites. Let me show you! Oh, but first you should try the punch. I made the punch.”</p>
<p>Buffy, Willow, Xander and Lucy looked at each other with wide eyes as Mrs. Kendall pushed through them to reach the drinks table and handed a plastic cup of pink punch to each of them, even Xander, who already had a full cup of lemonade. Mrs. Kendall then grabbed Lucy’s wrist and tried to lead her in what Buffy assumed was the direction of her sister’s painting.</p>
<p>Lucy quickly freed herself. “I would love to see that painting Mrs. Kendall, but I just saw someone who shouldn’t be here and I’m going to go get them to leave.”</p>
<p>Mom chuckled. “Lucy, that’s security’s job.”</p>
<p>“Yeah, well, they’ll actually listen to me.” Lucy put her free hand on the side of her neck and looked at Buffy. Buffy quickly realized what she was signalling and held back a groan. Of course Spike would decide to party crash.            </p>
<p>Lucy put her cup back on the table. “Besides, you should probably work on finding the person who spiked the punch.”</p>
<p>Everyone looked down at their punch as Lucy left.</p>
<p>Mrs. Kendall allowed them to abandon their punch after she took one sip and declared it pure alcohol. She then marched Mom off to find security, leaving Buffy, Willow and Xander to prepare in case Lucy wasn’t able to get Spike out of the party. Buffy passed out the stakes that she had in her purse and Xander showed them the cross he had hidden in his jacket. They all had their heads on swivels to look out for Spike and any other vampires he might have brought with him.</p>
<p>Willow tugged on the sleeve of Buffy’s dress. “Look, there’s Lucy!”</p>
<p>Buffy looked where Willow was pointing but too many people had moved in the way, clustering around a painting, for her to see her cousin. Xander stood on his toes and looked over people’s heads. His mouth dropped open.</p>
<p>“Uh oh,” he said.</p>
<p>“What? What is it?” Buffy demanded.</p>
<p>Xander shook his finger in the direction he had been looking. “This is bad.”</p>
<p>“What?” Buffy exclaimed.</p>
<p>Xander didn’t have to answer because just then the crowd started parting with shrieks and mutters. Lucy stood in the middle of the room. Her feet were bare and her eyes were unfocused. Her mouth was stained blood red.</p>
<p>“Uh oh,” Willow said quietly.</p>
<p>Lucy held out the red-haired china doll she was carrying with both hands. Words spilled out of her mouth in a language that Buffy didn’t know, and she was pretty sure that Lucy didn’t know it either.</p>
<p>Black smoke spewed out of the doll’s mouth. It ignored Lucy and rushed through the man in the checkered suit, who was standing nearest to her. The man collapsed like he was a marionette whose strings had been cut. With all her experience, Buffy knew that he was dead.</p>
<p>It took less than a second for people to start running away. The tidal wave of people made it harder for Buffy to run towards Lucy and the cloud of smoke, but she did end up leaving Xander and Willow behind long before she got to the spot where Lucy had been standing. Unfortunately, Lucy had moved. Buffy looked around and saw that she was following the smoke. The smoke now had a vaguely human shape and was reaching out for people, grabbing them by the head and dropping them after a moment. Sometimes the person fell down dead, but more often Buffy saw them collapse into sobbing heaps and crawl away from the smoke monster as fast as they could.</p>
<p>“What should we do?” Willow asked when she and Xander caught up with Buffy.</p>
<p>“Kill the doll,” Buffy said after a split second of thought. “Xander, get everyone out of here in case we make it worse. Willow, smash the doll.”</p>
<p>“What about you?” Xander asked.</p>
<p>Buffy looked at the smoke, which now very obviously formed a woman. “I’m going to be the distraction.”</p>
<p>“Isn’t that my job?” Xander asked as she walked away.</p>
<p>Buffy threw her stake as hard as she could at the smoke woman. It flew straight through her and ended up embedded in the opposite wall.</p>
<p>The smoke woman slowly turned until she was facing Buffy. “Slayer,” she hissed.</p>
<p>“Good, you got the memo,” Buffy said. “But as a refresher, this is the part where we fight.”</p>
<p>The smoke woman dove towards Buffy with a screech. Smoke streamed out behind her. Buffy ducked and rolled out of reach of her grasping hands. The smoke woman screamed again.</p>
<p>As Buffy dodged another attack, she saw Willow sneaking up behind Lucy and making a grab for the doll. She would have succeeded if Lucy hadn’t moved to keep up with the smoke woman. It was really looking like the smoke woman needed the doll to exist, but they wouldn’t be able to destroy it if she kept moving.</p>
<p>“I want your blood, Slayer!” the smoke woman shrieked. “Give it to me!”</p>
<p>“That’ll be a no,” Buffy said as she ducked behind a block of spray paint covered concrete. “Thanks for the offer though.”</p>
<p>“Buffy!” Xander shouted. He threw something towards her and she caught it easily. It was a bottle of holy water that Lucy had been carrying. Deciding that it couldn’t hurt, Buffy opened the bottle and threw the water out in an arch at the smoke woman. There was a hissing sound as the water hit.</p>
<p>The smoke woman screamed in obvious pain. “How dare you! I’ll kill you!” Buffy prepared to avoid being hit by her, but the smoke woman messed that up when she billowed in the opposite direction.</p>
<p>Xander yelped and dove to the side. The smoke woman’s grasping hands would have just missed him if they hadn’t suddenly grown claws. The claws hooked into the bottom of Xander’s shirt and allowed the smoke woman to pull him back towards her. Xander tried to fight her off but apparently her tangibility still only went one way.</p>
<p>Many things then happened at once. Buffy ran across the room to reach Xander and the smoke women, Willow lashed out with the stake she was still holding and knocked the doll out of Lucy’s hands, and the smoke women grew fangs and bit into Xander’s neck.</p>
<p>The doll shattered on the floor. Red smoke rose from its pieces and streamed down over Xander and the smoke woman. When it cleared the smoke woman had become the redhead woman from Buffy’s dream, dress and all, and Xander was crumpled at her feet.</p>
<p>The woman wiped Xander’s blood off her lips with the back of her hand. Then she studied her limbs, wiggling her fingers and turning her head to look at her legs from all angles. She smiled with a mouthful of fangs. “Not quite what I was promised, but I find it pleasant. Wouldn’t you agree, children?”</p>
<p>Buffy kicked her in the gut.</p>
<p>The woman’s hair streamed out like a red banner as the full Slayer-strength kick sent her flying across the room. She smashed through the back wall and through the hole she left Buffy saw her land just short of one of the many statues in the gallery’s garden. Then the statue moved, stabbing down with the knife it was holding and somehow causing the shark-toothed woman to burst into flames.</p>
<p>Giles walked through the back door, wiping his knife off with a handkerchief as he went. “Is everyone all right?”</p>
<p>“Not really,” Buffy said. She walked around a dead woman and dropped to her knees next to Xander. His neck, shoulder and every bit in between were a bloody mess, but at least the bleeding showed that there was still blood inside him.</p>
<p>“Oh dear lord,” Giles said. He pulled another handkerchief out of his jacket and handed it to Buffy before running off to phone for an ambulance.</p>
<p>Buffy carefully put pressure on Xander’s wound so that she wouldn’t end up accidentally breaking his neck. Once she was sure he wouldn’t be in any more danger, she looked up to check on Lucy. Her cousin was curled up on her side on the floor, shaking like a leaf. Willow was patting her shoulder and saying comforting things while shooting worried looks in Xander and Buffy’s direction. Buffy was sure this was the only reason her mom didn’t mistake Lucy for one of the corpses when she came back into the room.</p>
<p>Mom’s face went white. “What happened?” she exclaimed, looking around the ruined room.</p>
<p>“Wolves,” Willow said quickly at the same time as Buffy said, “Bear.”</p>
<p>The two of them looked at each other. “Gas leak?” Willow suggested. “Maybe we were hallucinating.”</p>
<p>Buffy was pretty sure that would end up being the official cause.</p>
<p>The ambulance finally arrived and Xander was hurried to the hospital. Lucy had mostly calmed down by that point so Buffy didn’t feel guilty for climbing into Giles’s car and following the ambulance to the hospital. Willow was obviously riding in the ambulance with Xander.</p>
<p>Buffy, Giles and Willow were stuck in the nearly empty waiting room while Xander was wheeled into surgery. They still hadn’t gotten any news when Mom and Lucy arrived. Mom was only there for a few seconds because there were a lot of things at the gallery that she still needed to take care of. When she left, Buffy started pacing and Lucy took her emptied seat.</p>
<p>“Are you okay?” Willow asked Lucy. “Not all possessed-like anymore?”</p>
<p>Lucy nodded. “My body is all under my control. Anything on Xander?”</p>
<p>“He’s still in surgery,” Buffy said. She got bored of pacing and sat back down next to Willow. “What happened with Spike?”</p>
<p>Lucy blushed and put a hand on her stomach. “I was...kind of out of it. Let’s just say that vampire blood doesn’t taste as gross as you’d think.”</p>
<p>Buffy, Willow and Giles stared at her. “Ick,” Buffy said.</p>
<p>“Wait, is Lucy going to become a vampire now?” Willow asked Giles. “That’s not a good thing. That’s a very bad thing. She’s been bitten and she drank vampire blood and that’s what turns a human into a vampire, but she isn’t a vampire now so does that mean she won’t become a vampire? You aren’t a vampire, right Lucy? Can we stop her from becoming a vampire? If we stake Spike will she be okay? That’s how it works in the movies.”</p>
<p>“A human must be near death in order to become a vampire,” Giles said when Willow stopped to breathe. “I believe Lucy is out of danger.” He turned to Lucy, who was poking her wrist as if to check that she still had a pulse. “However, if you find yourself experiencing any strange symptoms, it would make a fascinating study. Humans remaining alive after ingesting vampire blood happens very rarely.”</p>
<p>“I’ll, uh, keep that in mind, Mr. Giles,” Lucy said. “Do you know what did this to Xander?”</p>
<p>Giles said something about a lee she fairy muse but was cut off when Buffy and Willow pounced on the first doctor to come into the waiting room. “How’s Xander?”</p>
<p>The doctor smiled at them. “Your friend is going to be fine. He’s a lucky young man. We had just enough blood to replace what he lost. He’ll be out of surgery any minute now.”</p>
<p>“Can we see him?” Willow asked.</p>
<p>The doctor shook her head. “He’ll be unconscious for a while yet. You should come back tomorrow.”</p>
<p>“We’re not going anywhere,” Willow said. She sat back down and crossed her arms pointedly. Buffy sat next to her.</p>
<p>The doctor smiled again. “Xander is very lucky to have friends like you.” She left the waiting room and the four of them settled in for a long wait.</p>
  </div></div>
<a name="section0009"><h2>9. Something Like a Seer</h2></a>
<div class="story"><div class="userstuff module">
    
    <p>
  <strong>
    <em>Spike</em>
  </strong>
</p>
<p>The sound of stumbling and bodies hitting the floor made Spike look up from the books he had spread out on the table in front of him. Drusilla was spinning dreamily across the floor of the factory with no concern for any of the minions in her path. The minions were forced to get out of her way as quickly as possible since Spike had made it clear that if any of them touched her without her permission he would rip their head off. Dalton, the only minion they had with more than half a brain, jumped straight up into the air and grabbed the edge of a walkway with one hand while holding a book in the other when Drusilla’s movements gave him no other option.  </p>
<p>Spike got up and walked over to Drusilla. “What brings you upstairs, pet? You have a guest.”</p>
<p>Drusilla stroked his cheek with the end of the pale blue scarf she had draped over her shoulders, the girl’s scarf. “I’m sad. The white knight is alive and our kitten won’t play.”</p>
<p>“Well, that’s not very nice of them.” He had no bloody clue who the white knight was, but he could fix the problem with their kitten for his princess. He put his hands around Drusilla’s waist and lifted her into the air, spinning around with her once. “Let’s go see what’s wrong with the girl.”</p>
<p>The girl was curled up in a far corner of their room with her arms wrapped around her legs and her eyes squeezed shut, whimpering. There wasn’t a mark on her that Spike could see.</p>
<p>“She’s all splintered,” Drusilla said, with some fascination. “It’s too bright for her.”</p>
<p>The girl lifted her head. “Spike?”</p>
<p>Spike stepped around the foot of the bed and looked down at her. The girl’s face was streaked with tears.</p>
<p>“It’s too clear,” the girl said, her eyes still closed. “Make it stop, Spike.”</p>
<p>Spike found himself crouching in front of her and tucking a stray curl behind her ear. “What’s wrong, kitten?”</p>
<p>The girl’s eyes shot open. “You know my name! I know you know. Use my name.”</p>
<p>“Lucy,” Spike said quickly. He got the feeling that mollifying the gir—mollifying <em>Lucy</em> was the way to go. Something about the way she was holding herself and the look in her eyes, well, to be honest it scared him. “Tell me what to make stop.”</p>
<p>“The visions,” Lucy said. “I see what she sees. I didn’t before. It’s her blood, it must be.”</p>
<p>Well, that was unexpected.</p>
<p>Spike looked over his shoulder at the only other she in the room. “Drusilla darling, where exactly did you disappear to last night?”</p>
<p>“The moon was vanishing,” Drusilla said softly. “Twila wanted to dance with the Slayer.”</p>
<p>That blasted faerie. The Slayer was his to kill.</p>
<p>“Well, since I saw the Slayer not an hour ago looking quite alive it seems that she failed,” Spike said sarcastically.</p>
<p>“Be nice,” Drusilla chided.</p>
<p>“Yes, well, I’m sure she tried her best,” Spike said. “What else did you do?”</p>
<p>Drusilla smiled. “Our kitten came to see me. She couldn’t have milk so I gave her blood. Like dancing, it was.”</p>
<p>As Drusilla swayed to imagined music, Spike thought about what she had said. The leannán sídhe that had been trapped in a doll tried to kill the Slayer. The logical question to ask would be how the faerie got out of the doll, but he had a feeling that Drusilla feeding Lucy her blood answered that. It also answered how Lucy managed to see what Drusilla did baring her being a seer herself.</p>
<p>“Not a seer,” Lucy muttered.</p>
<p>Spike turned back to her. “I know you’re not, kitten. It’s a little trick Dru stole from Dracula, is all. It’ll pass.” That wasn’t even a lie. The psychic connection between Lucy and Drusilla would fade once Spike sired Lucy.</p>
<p>Drusilla giggled. “No, silly. You have it upside inside out. She’s ours forever.”</p>
<p>“This is useless,” Lucy said. “Don’t be stupid.” She closed her eyes again. When she opened them after several moments they were a lot more focused and blazing with anger. “You won’t sire me.”</p>
<p>Spike raised his eyebrows. “Won’t I?” He shifted into his demon face.</p>
<p>Lucy’s heart sped up but she kept her gaze locked with his. “Drusilla may be insane, but she’s still a seer. She hasn’t seen it.”</p>
<p>Spike growled. Drusilla wasn’t insane, not really. She just had a love of childlike whimsy.</p>
<p>“You love her,” Lucy said. “You don’t want to think she might be wrong, but she is.”</p>
<p>“You’re bluffing.” Spike grabbed Lucy’s jaw with one hand and tilted her head to the side, exposing her neck. He touched his lips to the faint scar of where he had bitten her before. “I could sire you now and we’ll see what you say about it afterwards.”</p>
<p>“<em>You’re</em> bluffing,” Lucy said. Her voice shook. Spike sifted into demon face and opened his mouth, brushing his fangs against her skin. “Okay, okay! I’m lying! It’s bad enough seeing clearly what she thinking now, I’m not going to go digging through her head for more!”</p>
<p>Spike drew back. “What d’you mean ‘digging through her head’?” He was pretty sure the connection didn’t work like that.</p>
<p>The blood drained from Lucy’s face. “I-I-”</p>
<p>Spike growled and she shrank back. “You listen. Dru’s been hurt enough without you messing around in her head, screwing things up—”</p>
<p>“It doesn’t work like that!” Lucy exclaimed. “I just <em>see</em> and<em> hear</em>. I can’t touch!”</p>
<p>There was a whisper of skirts behind him and then Drusilla knelt down and wrapped her arms around his chest. She rested her chin on his shoulder. “She’s like me, Spike, only not.”</p>
<p>A seer only not. What on earth did that mean?</p>
<p>Drusilla kissed his cheek. “All our minds make poetry and pretty pictures,” she hinted.</p>
<p>Spike’s eyes widened as he realized what Drusilla was talking about. “A mind-reader. You’re a bloody mind-reader.”</p>
<p>Lucy took a shaky breath. “What if I am? We have a deal; you can’t use me against Buffy.”</p>
<p>He didn’t need the reminder. No matter how much fun it would be to kill Joyce Summers, he only really wanted the Slayer and Lucy. If he didn’t stick to their deal he was now sure Lucy would find some way to make sure he didn’t get either. As long as she could read his mind she would be one step ahead of him.</p>
<p>“But I can use you to do work for me.” Spike smiled. “We have a deal.”</p>
<p>Lucy bit her lip and nodded slowly. Her heart rate began to go back down to what it normally was when Spike heard it.</p>
<p>“So,” Spike asked nonchalantly, “are we going to get off the floor any time soon?” Lucy laughed awkwardly and stood up after taking the hand he offered.</p>
<p>Spike left his girls to whatever games Drusilla wanted to play and went back to his books. An hour or so later, after he’d yelled at Dalton for doing a translation wrong and come close to pulling his own hair out at the uselessness of the information he could read, Lucy came up to the factory floor. She had reclaimed her scarf and didn’t look like she was a second away from a nervous breakdown.</p>
<p>“Drusilla’s asleep,” she told Spike. “She’s dreaming about you torturing her with a cattle prod.”</p>
<p>“Really?” Spike raised his eyebrows in mild surprise. “We’ve never done that before. I’ll have to make a note.”</p>
<p>Lucy grimaced. “Why am I not surprised?”</p>
<p>Since she could apparently read his and Drusilla’s minds, not being surprised was the correct response. Drusilla loved being hurt and Spike was always happy to indulge her.</p>
<p>Spike stood up and stretched. “I assume you’re waiting for an escort so you get home not dead.”</p>
<p>“Yes please,” Lucy said. Then she blushed. “That wasn’t meant to sound like that.”</p>
<p>If she meant that it wasn’t meant to sound all hot and breathy like she wanted him to ravish her right then and there, then Spike would count himself disappointed. He and Drusilla hadn’t been properly together for ages and a vampire had more needs than just blood.</p>
<p>Lucy’s face turned even redder. She must have heard him thinking all of that. Spike didn’t even bother trying to hide his grin.</p>
<p>“You’re terrible,” Lucy grumbled as they began to make their way out of the factory.</p>
<p>“That’s why I’m the bad guy, luv. Try to keep up.”</p>
  </div></div>
<a name="section0010"><h2>10. Halloween</h2></a>
<div class="story"><div class="userstuff module">
    
    <p>
  <strong>
    <em>Lucy</em>
  </strong>
</p>
<p>The bell signalling the end of first period rang. Lucy yawned as she stuffed her biology notebook into her backpack. The Dingoes had played a late set at the Shelter last night and then afterwards she’d had to put the rest of her energy into slaying the over appreciative fan who decided she wanted to follow them and turn the entire band into vampires. It was her first solo slaying, which she couldn’t help feeling more than a little proud of, but it left her with bumps and bruises that made sleeping on her fold-out bed uncomfortable. At least she didn’t break house rules. The punishment for killing at the Shelter was a lot more painful and permanent than a few minor injuries.</p>
<p>Soul gave her a wave as he and the rest of the guys headed to their next class. Lucy was one of the last people out and moving slower than usual thanks to her injuries. She was lucky that she had a free period next with the rest of the monster hunters club so she didn’t have to rush.</p>
<p>“Hey, hey, hey,” Xander said as he threw an arm around Lucy’s shoulders. “Hail the conquering hero. Buffy was telling us about your slayage last night.”</p>
<p>“Yeah,” Lucy squeaked, “and your bag is hitting about seven bruised ribs from said slayage.”</p>
<p>Xander sprang away from Lucy like he’d been shocked. “Oopsie.”</p>
<p>Lucy smiled to show him that it was all good before putting a hand on her ribs and groaning.  </p>
<p>“I thought you said you were fine,” Buffy said with a frown.</p>
<p>“Well, I wasn’t bleeding out half the blood in my body,” Lucy replied. “Speaking of, how are you feeling, Xander?”</p>
<p>“He’s getting his stitches out next week,” Willow said excitedly.</p>
<p>“Yup, no more Frankensteining for this guy.” Xander grinned.</p>
<p>“Don’t joke about that!” Willow exclaimed as they walked through a gaggle of freshmen heading in the opposite direction. “Remember Daryl?”</p>
<p>Xander and Buffy grimaced. Lucy was about to ask who Daryl was when they turned the corner and saw Principal Snyder grabbing a girl by the arm and shoving a pen and clipboard into her hands.</p>
<p>“Snyder must be in charge of the Volunteer Safety Program for Halloween this year,” Willow said.</p>
<p>Xander gave a single chuckle. “Note his interesting take on the concept of volunteer.”</p>
<p>They walked past the table covered with an orange plastic table cloth where Snyder and a few actual student volunteers were getting other people to sign up.</p>
<p>“What’s the deal?” Buffy asked when they stopped at Willow’s locker.</p>
<p>Xander sighed. “A bunch of kids need someone to take them trick-or-treating. Sign up and get your own pack of sugar-hyped little demons for the night, the human kind.”</p>
<p>“That kind of sounds like fun,” Lucy said. Xander turned to her with a look of total disbelief. “I like kids,” she argued. “And it’s an excuse for people our age to dress up and go trick-or-treating.”</p>
<p>Xander pointed at her with one finger. “You are wounded so I’m going to go with smiling and nodding.” He then proceeded to do just that, nodding slowly with a big, exaggerated smile plastered on.</p>
<p>Lucy chuckled and leaned against the locker between Xander and Willow. Her favourite thing about Halloween was trick-or-treating, or rather the chocolate that came from trick-or-treating. She hadn’t been able to go out last year, but the hospital had a Halloween party for the patients who were there on a constant basis with more than enough candy to make up for it. All of the kids in the cancer ward had gone dressed as superheroes. Rose, her friend and usual roommate who had the same kind of lung cancer as her, was Wonder Woman. A five year old boy with leukemia was a tiny Iron Man. There were three Batmans, two of whom were brothers with a kind of nerve cancer. Quinn had been Green Arrow two weeks after his leg had been amputated and needed a wheelchair that he said just added to the authenticity of his costume (his argument being that Green Arrow didn’t have super healing so he probably would eventually end up in a wheelchair). Lucy had, after a lot of cajoling from Quinn, dressed up as Black Canary and kissed Quinn under the orange paper chain strung across the ceiling after she lost a bet with Rose that she didn’t remember anything about.</p>
<p>As far as she knew, aside from her and tiny Iron Man, they were all dead now.        </p>
<p>The unpleasant voice of Principle Snyder silenced everyone within a five foot radius. “Miss Summers. Just the juvenile delinquent I was looking for.”</p>
<p>“Eep,” Willow said quietly. Lucy had to agree with her. The look on Snyder’s face was just creepy.</p>
<p>“Halloween must be a big night for you,” Snyder continued. “Throwing eggs at cars, throwing toilet paper on houses, bobbing for apples, one pathetic cry for help after another. Well, not this year missy.” He guided Buffy to the table and held out a pen and a clipboard with the sign-up sheet on it. Buffy looked at them like they were covered in some unidentifiable demon goo.</p>
<p>“Gee, I would love to help,” Buffy said with horribly faked sincerity, “but I have recently developed carpal tunnel syndrome and can tragically no longer hold a flashlight.”</p>
<p>Snyder wasn’t fooled. “The program starts at four. The children have to be back by six.”</p>
<p>Lucy joined Willow and Xander, who had followed Buffy and were standing behind her. They watched as Buffy was given no choice but to sign up. Snyder grabbed three more pens and held them out for them to take. Lucy had to stop herself from laughing at the look of dismay on Xander’s face.</p>
<p>Xander was still wallowing in utter disbelief by the time they had crossed the courtyard to get to the studying/hang out area where they usually spent their free period when Mr. Giles didn’t need them in the library. “We have to get dressed up and everything?”</p>
<p>“Snyder said costumes were mandatory,” Willow reminded him.</p>
<p>Buffy sighed. “And I was going to stay in and veg. The one night a year that things are supposed to be quiet for me.”</p>
<p>That statement was enough to distract Xander. “Really? I figured Halloween would be a huge vamp scare-a-palooza.”</p>
<p>“Not according to Giles. Apparently Halloween is like dead for the undead,” Buffy said.</p>
<p>“They stay in?” Lucy asked as she sat down next to Willow. “Fun for us.”</p>
<p>“Those wacky vamps just keep you guessing,” Xander said with a grin. “That’s why I love ‘em.”</p>
<p>While Xander went to buy a drink, Lucy took one of Mr. Giles’s books and a Latin dictionary out of her bag. All of the interesting information was in Latin, Sumerian or some other language that no one except Watchers and really intense professors spoke anymore. Willow and (surprisingly) Xander were already old pros at Latin and Xander was learning to read Akkadian for some reason that Lucy didn’t understand even with reading his mind (it had something to do with a horse, a cow and a man-eating plant) so Lucy had a lot of catching up to do.</p>
<p>Lucy was so absorbed in her translation that she didn’t notice Buffy get up from the table. She did notice when Buffy slammed a boy into the soda machine hard enough to knock a can loose and told him to get gone.</p>
<p>“Well, that’s a problem,” Lucy said.</p>
<p>“What is?” Willow asked. “Stopping Xander from popping stitches?”</p>
<p> “No, though that is a good point. I’m friends with four teenage boys and Buffy—” Lucy was cut off by Buffy returning to their table with a frown on her face while Xander grabbed his bag and stormed away.</p>
<p>“I think I just broke the guy code, big time,” Buffy said.</p>
<p>Lucy nodded. “Yeah, you did.”</p>
<p>“Boys, so fragile,” Willow said.</p>
<p>Lucy’s responding snicker quickly devolved into a sad laugh, which further devolved into putting her head in her arms and crying quietly. Buffy and Willow kept talking about Buffy’s date with Angel, so it seemed that she was successful with the not drawing attention part. It would have been embarrassing if she wasn’t. Crying without drawing attention was something she had a lot of practice with.</p>
<p>“Hey, Lucy?” Willow asked.</p>
<p>Lucy wiped tears off her face with her sleeves as she sat up. “Yeah, what? Did I miss something?”</p>
<p>“We’re going to break into Giles’s private files and read up on Angel in the Watchers Diaries,” Buffy said. “Want to come?”</p>
<p>“Oh, um, translations,” Lucy said, pointing at the book that she had pushed aside before she started crying. “Also maybe taking a nap. I’ll pass.”</p>
<p>Buffy nodded and walked off without another word. Willow paused to hand Lucy a slim binder filled with papers. “This is everything I found about your doctor guy. I’m still looking into some stuff, but this should be good to start.”</p>
<p>Lucy smiled at her. “Thanks, Willow. You’re the best.”</p>
<p>Willow blushed. “I try.”</p>
<p>When Willow was gone, Lucy looked down at the binder in her hands. These papers held everything Willow could look up, decrypt and hack into about the man who’d made her and Quinn mind-readers, the man who was supposed to be treating their cancer but decided to add a little something extra to the drugs he put in their veins, the man whose experiments drove Rose mad and made her jump from the roof of the hospital.</p>
<p>Seriously, Drusilla was in better shape than the kids he’d experimented on and that was judging based on back when they were alive.</p>
<p>Lucy knew that she shouldn’t read it where she was, all out in the open where anyone could see, but she couldn’t resist taking a little peek before going to find an unoccupied storage closet. The page she turned to made her even more certain that Willow was the goddess of computer research. She didn’t even know she wanted to know who Dr. Capson’s lawyers were before Willow found his dealings with Wolfram &amp; Hart.</p>
<hr/>
<p>After school, Lucy went with Buffy, Willow and Xander to a new costume store that had opened just in time for the day before Halloween rush. Her mind was still running through the information Willow had found for her, so when they split up to find costumes she drifted through the store in a daze until a set of shelves full of wigs caught her eye. She hadn’t been sure what she was going to dress up as, but as she examined a blonde wig and found that it was fairly good/not horrible quality (something she had learned about from Rose after they had both lost their hair) her decision was made. As a bonus, she found out that the wig was half off when she went to pay for it, so she didn’t spend all the money that Aunt Joy had given her for her costume. Since Aunt Joy said that she could keep whatever was left there would definitely be a new book or cassette tape in her future, probably the newest Green Day album.</p>
<p>“What did you get?” Willow asked when Lucy and Xander rejoined her and Buffy. Lucy held up the clear bag with her wig and Xander showed off his plastic gun.</p>
<p>Buffy raised an eyebrow. “I hate to tell you, but a wig and a gun do not a costume make.”</p>
<p>Lucy smiled. “I’m wearing my costume from last year. This is just a finishing touch.”</p>
<p>“I’ve got fatigues from an army surplus at home,” Xander said. “Just call me the two dollar costume king, baby.”</p>
<p>Willow was holding a bag with a classic ghost costume and Buffy didn’t have a costume yet. She cut off her apology to/argument with Xander to pick out a hoop-skirted princess dress that the store’s owner sold to her for more than half off, plus a curly black wig, and then they were ready to leave.</p>
<p>After school the next day, Willow went with Buffy and Lucy to their house for some girl time before they had to go back to school with Xander to pick up the kids. They had about an hour before they had to start changing into their costumes. Willow and Lucy wanted to get some homework done but they got a little bit sidetracked talking about boys. Oops.</p>
<p>Lucy and Buffy both dove into the closet for costume parts. Buffy was determined to get Willow out of her shell for Halloween and put a few of her more daring clothing options into her friend’s hands before turning her attention to her own costume.</p>
<p>Lucy exchanged her jeans for fishnet stockings and short black shorts that served as one half of her black leather bodysuit substitute. The other half was a second-hand black bustier top that was actually (faux) leather and laced up in the back with black cord through metal grommets. She needed Buffy’s help to lace up the top (tight enough to stay up but not so tight that it aggravated her bruised ribs) and repaid her by zipping up the back of her dress. The costume was finished with a dark blue leather jacket, black gloves, tall black boots, a simple black choker, and, of course, her blonde wig.</p>
<p>Lucy and Buffy took turns with the mirror making sure their wigs were secure. Buffy had arranged her black curls into a half up, half down style that she didn’t seem to be totally satisfied with but eventually stopped fussing over.</p>
<p>“Come on, Willow. Let’s see how you look,” Buffy called towards the bathroom where Willow had long ago changed into her costume.</p>
<p>“I don’t know...” Willow said.</p>
<p>“You can’t hide in there all night,” Buffy said. “Come on out!”</p>
<p>Willow reluctantly stepped around the bathroom door. The clothes that Buffy had given her hugged her curves and showed about a foot of her abdomen. Willow even seemed to have gotten into her costume at some point because she had put on very dramatic (for her) makeup and her hair was up in a bun with tendrils escaping around her face.</p>
<p>“Look at you!” Buffy smiled.</p>
<p>Willow smiled awkwardly as Buffy dragged her in front of the full length mirror. “Yeah, look at me. There’s a lot of me to look at.”</p>
<p>“I could ditch the jacket, if it makes you feel better,” Lucy offered. “I think Snyder would probably kick me out of school though.”</p>
<p>Willow looked at Lucy and her eyes widened. “Oh, wow.” She blushed and quickly looked away. “Look at Buffy’s costume. You look great, Buffy! Does Angel know about your costume?”</p>
<p>“Nope,” Buffy said. “It’s a surprise. I’m going to show Angel that I can coif with the best of them.”</p>
<p>“Wait, is this whole princess thing about Angel?” Lucy asked.</p>
<p>“Actually, she’s an eighteenth century noblewoman,” Willow corrected.</p>
<p>Lucy shook her head. “Same difference. Angel loves you for who you are, not the clothes you wear or how many forks you know how to use.”</p>
<p>Willow turned to face Buffy with an apologetic frown on her face. “You know, she does have a point.”</p>
<p>Before Buffy could mount a defence, the phone rang and then the doorbell went off.</p>
<p>“That’ll be Xander,” Buffy said. She turned quickly and left the room.</p>
<p>“Lucy,” Aunt Joy called from downstairs, “one of the boys from your band is on the phone. Devon?”</p>
<p>“I’ve got it, Aunt Joy,” Lucy called back. She picked up the phone on Buffy’s bedside table. “Hello?”</p>
<p>“The Shelter wants us to play for them tonight,” Devon said without any preamble. “Meet us at school in ten minutes.”</p>
<p>“Wait, Devon!” Lucy said before he could hang up. “I can’t play tonight.”</p>
<p>The line was silent for a few seconds. “Why?” Devon asked.</p>
<p>“I’ve got the Halloween safety thing,” Lucy told him. “Snyder was being Snyder and...Look, I can’t back out. Why does the Shelter want us anyway? We just played there.”</p>
<p>“Well, they like us,” Devon said with frustration. “And that us includes you so you need to be there.”</p>
<p>“Do you want to talk to Snyder and get me out of this?” Lucy asked. Devon was silent. “That’s what I thought. You guys will be fine without me. I have it on good authority that the place will probably be dead anyway.”</p>
<p>More than half the patrons at the Shelter were demons, so it wasn’t a big stretch to guess that they’d be spending Halloween at home. Actually, that was probably why the Dingoes had been called in. The band that usually played on Friday nights was made up of Britzai demons (red eyes, extensive tattoos that spelled out their clan to any other Britzais, and a fondness for bone marrow of any kind) who probably wanted to take Halloween as a day off.</p>
<p>Devon grumbled but grudgingly agreed after Lucy spent a few minutes stroking his ego that they could manage without their rhythm guitarist for one night. As she hung up, Lucy sighed. Devon was...gloriously uncomplicated. When it came to the band he didn’t respond to logic but praising the songs he had written worked wonders.</p>
<p>Willow had escaped downstairs while Lucy was on the phone. When Lucy caught up with her, Buffy and Xander, she wasn’t entirely surprised to see that Willow had covered her costume with the sheet ghost that she had bought.</p>
<p>“Wow,” Xander said when he saw Lucy. “You look hot.” His eyes widened. “And by ‘hot’ I meant temperature. That’s all leather, right? Can you even breathe in that thing? I’m going to shut up now.”</p>
<p>The three girls laughed. “At ease, solider,” Lucy said. “Meet your new commanding officer, the Black Canary.” She gave a little curtsy. “Not only can I breathe, I can kick your butt.”</p>
<p>“Two deadly girls,” Buffy said. “Just what the hellmouth ordered.”</p>
<p>They were assigned their groups of kids as soon as they arrived at school. Lucy’s was made up of a girl dressed as a glittery fairy princess, another whose costume was a tutu-wearing cat, a boy dressed as the most adorable tiny vampire, and two brothers with monster masks, one red and the other green. Lucy smiled and told them they looked great, and then they followed Xander’s marching line of trick-or-treaters out of the school.</p>
<hr/>
<p>Black Canary opened her eyes. A yowling cat in a pink tutu ran across her path, followed by glittering light surrounding a shape that moved too fast for her to see. She didn’t have a chance to take in her surroundings before she was attacked from behind. She turned her fall forward into a roll and reoriented herself so that she was facing her attackers in a ready position.</p>
<p>Three child-sized monsters came running at her with fangs bared. They were so close that the first solution she thought of was to open her mouth and scream. Her sonic scream cowed the monsters, sending them to the ground with their hands over their ears. The pale monster with a wrinkled face seemed to be especially hurt. Black Canary thought she could see blood coming out of its ears.</p>
<p>While the monsters were down, Black Canary stepped back and took a look at her surroundings. She was on a suburban street where the houses were covered in Halloween decorations. The things running around weren’t trick-or-treaters though, but rather monsters, witches, robots and other beings that weren’t usually around in such large concentrations unless there was an end of the world type event. She quickly checked her pockets for her Justice League communicator and sighed when she didn’t find it. It looked like she would be doing this the hard way, or as her mom would probably say, the reckless way.</p>
<p>Several kicks and punches and one more sonic scream later, all the monsters on the street had fled or been knocked unconscious. The sound of at least two people running around the corner behind you had Black Canary whirling around, ready for another fight.</p>
<p>“Lucy!” a redheaded girl exclaimed. “Are you alright?”</p>
<p>Black Canary looked at the girl, an American solider carrying an assault rifle, and a second girl wearing a fancy old-fashioned dress who cowered behind the solider. She relaxed her stance slightly since the group didn’t seem to be much of a threat, but only slightly. “Who’s Lucy?”</p>
<p>The redhead sighed. “Right, costume. Our friend dressed up as Black Canary for Halloween and now you’re her. Or she’s you. But you’re here and she’s not but she is.”</p>
<p>Black Canary stared at her for a moment. “Magic?” she asked. The girl nodded.</p>
<p>The solider was looking around at the monsters scattered across the street. “Did you do this, lady?” he asked with disbelief. “We heard screams.”</p>
<p>“The name’s Black Canary,” Black Canary said. “And screaming tends to be useful for me.”</p>
<p>“She’s got this sonic scream,” the redhead explained. “It hurts people and stuff. Come on, we’re going to get inside and regroup.”</p>
<p>Black Canary didn’t see anything wrong with that plan, so she brought up the rear of the group as the redheaded girl, who introduced herself as Willow, led them through the street. They didn’t have very far to go before Willow veered towards the side door of one of the few houses that didn’t have its lights on.</p>
<p>The solider, who was called Booth but who Willow said was actually Xander, took point and carefully opened the door. Buffy, the damsel in distress, clung to the back of his fatigues.</p>
<p>“Clear,” Booth said.</p>
<p>Willow was the first one inside. “Ms. Summers? Ms. Summers? Okay, she’s not here.”</p>
<p>“Whose house is this?” the damsel asked, poking the countertop.</p>
<p>“Yours,” Willow said.</p>
<p>There was a pounding at the front door. Booth and Black Canary ran to see what it was, and Booth got into an argument with Willow, saying that there could be a civilian looking for help. That argument was shot to hell when a scaly green arm broke through one of the small windows in the door. Booth shot through the window to scare the monster off and then ran outside, slamming the door in Black Canary’s face.</p>
<p>“Idiot,” Black Canary muttered. She reached for the doorknob to open the door and go after him.</p>
<p>“Wait!” Willow said. “We’re supposed to be regrouping.”</p>
<p>“Your friend is going to get himself killed,” Black Canary said.</p>
<p>“Yeah, well, he’s got a gun and, and you don’t,” Willow exclaimed.</p>
<p>Black Canary frowned. “I am a world-class martial artist—”</p>
<p>“You’re a teenager who only started learning to fight three weeks ago!” Willow interrupted. “And you’re injured!”</p>
<p>That probably explained the pain that Black Canary was feeling in her ribs, arms and back. She had just been ignoring it.</p>
<p>Booth came back inside with a girl dressed in a torn cat costume. Black Canary glared at him. “You know, a good solider would give his squad mates some warning when he decides to go running into hostile territory.” Booth just shrugged and started checking the windows.</p>
<p>After Willow explained the situation to the cat girl, Cordelia, she ordered them to sit tight while she went to get help. That made sense. As much as Black Canary and Booth wanted to go out there and help civilians, they didn’t know what they were dealing with. Black Canary could see some monsters through the windows that she wouldn’t want to face without at least half the Justice League by her side. They could get themselves killed trying to help and that wouldn’t be any use to anyone, least of all the people whose bodies they were currently occupying.</p>
<p>Willow walked through a wall and left them to barricade the house. Black Canary helped Booth cover the two large windows downstairs and then went upstairs with Cordelia to make sure everything was locked up there. By the time Black Canary got back downstairs, Booth and the damsel had been joined by a young man in a leather jacket who was looking back and forth between them.</p>
<p>“Does someone want to fill me in here?” the young man asked.</p>
<p>“Who are you?” Black Canary asked.</p>
<p>“Do you live here?” Booth asked.</p>
<p>The young man scoffed. “No, Xander, you know that.” He knew them then, or at least knew Xander and probably Buffy.</p>
<p>“Actually, he doesn’t,” Black Canary said. “Call it amnesia. Your friends’ bodies are here but something made their costumes take over. I’m Black Canary, he’s Booth, she’s probably lady something-or-other, and Willow’s gone to get help.”</p>
<p>The young man looked at her with his mouth slightly open. “Oh,” he said. “Does Willow know who she is?”</p>
<p>“Yeah, she’s just a ghost,” Booth said. So that was how she could walk through walls. Black Canary had thought that it was just a superpower.</p>
<p>“Oh,” the young man said again. “I’m Angel.”</p>
<p>“Pleasure,” Black Canary said with a nod. Then she turned to Booth. “Upstairs is sealed up tight, though Cordelia might have gotten lost looking for the washroom.”</p>
<p>“No I didn’t,” Cordelia said as she walked in from the kitchen. She smiled at Angel. “How are you?”</p>
<p>Just then, the lights went out. The damsel let out a little eek and clung to Cordelia’s arm. Cordelia pushed her off. “Do you mind?”</p>
<p>“I’ll check upstairs again,” Black Canary said.</p>
<p>Booth nodded. “Angel, you and the princess secure the kitchen. Catwoman, you’re with me.”</p>
<p>Black Canary found herself chuckling as she climbed the stairs. She was pretty sure that Catwoman would hate being compared to Cordelia.</p>
<p>The bedrooms and the bathroom were all empty. All of the windows were closed. There weren’t any problems upstairs except for a warty gargoyle thing sitting in the middle of the hallway. It looked at Black Canary as she stepped out of the bedroom that looked like it was being used for storage and went flying at her with a shriek. Black Canary kicked it in the chest and it lost control of its wings, coming in for a crash landing at the bottom of the stairs. She ran after it, picked it up by the scruff of its neck, and threw it out the front door. As the door slammed behind it Black Canary caught a glimpse of the gargoyle colliding with a Sasquatch-like monster’s face.</p>
<p>The noise of fighting in the kitchen didn’t give Black Canary time to catch her breath. She got there in time to see Booth pulling a wrinkly-faced monster off of Angel, who got off the floor and punched the monster in the stomach. Cordelia was standing off to the side with a chair in her hands.</p>
<p>“Boys, move,” Black Canary ordered.</p>
<p>“But—” Booth said.</p>
<p>“Now! Trust me!”</p>
<p>Booth and Angel dove out of the way and Black Canary let loose with her sonic scream. All the glass in the kitchen shattered. The monster tumbled out the open door and ran away.</p>
<p>“What was that?” Angel asked loudly.</p>
<p>“Sonic scream,” Booth said, sounding impressed.</p>
<p>“What?” Angel asked. “I think my ear drums burst!”</p>
<p>“I wasn’t even aiming for you,” Black Canary said. “Where’s the princess?”</p>
<p>“Where what?” Angel asked. “Buffy ran away! We have to find her!”</p>
<p>“You know you don’t have to talk so loud, we can hear you,” Cordelia said.</p>
<p>“Let’s go,” Angel said. He walked out the door and the three of them followed, Black Canary stopping to grab a notepad and pen on the way out.</p>
<p>It didn’t take them long to find Buffy. The three of them who had working ears just followed the shrill screams and Angel followed the three of them. Booth decked the pirate that was attacking the princess while Cordelia talked her out of being afraid of Angel. Since Booth was perfectly capable of taking down the pirate by himself, Black Canary hung back and kept a lookout for any more monsters.</p>
<p>“That’s weird,” Booth said when the pirate had been buried under an avalanche of boxes. “Beating up that pirate gave me a very satisfying sense of closure.”</p>
<p>“Maybe Xander has something against pirates,” Black Canary said. She saw the boxes shift slightly and moved closer in case the pirate needed to be taken down again. Her attention was diverted by Willow silently running up to them and telling them that they needed to get inside. After Black Canary scribbled the message on her notepad for Angel to read, Angel said that they should find an empty warehouse. The sound of footsteps coming their way had the group running to do just that.</p>
<p>They barricaded themselves in a warehouse with the monsters hunting them right on their tail. The empty pallets and barrels that Booth, Angel and Black Canary piled against the doors weren’t enough to stop the horde from breaking in. The monsters streamed through the same door that they had used and Buffy screamed.</p>
<p>There was a brief scuffle, but the three fighters in their group were quickly overwhelmed by the supernaturally strong monsters. Black Canary parted her lips to let out a sonic scream but stopped herself long before Booth caught her eye and shook his head frantically. In this space her scream would do as much damage to them as it would to their enemies. Instead she worked on getting free from the two monsters holding her. Booth and Angel’s struggling against their captors wasn’t doing any good, so Black Canary took the next logical step and went limp. This surprised the two monsters holding her and before they could catch their balance she had wormed out of their grasp and sent a roundhouse kick at the head of the bleach blond wrinkly-faced monster that was bragging evilly to the cowering princess.    </p>
<p>The monster’s head snapped sideways. He growled and spun around. “Kind of busy here!”</p>
<p>“Monologuing?” Black Canary said. “I thought you might like to have a real fight.” She kicked him in the knees and dodged the attempts of his henchmonsters to recapture her.</p>
<p>The British (judging by his accent) blond stumbled backwards and landed right next to the princess. “I’ll kill you!”</p>
<p>Black Canary smiled. “Better people have tried.”</p>
<p>As the monster scrambled to his feet, Black Canary prepared to punch him very hard. Behind her she heard hits landing and since Willow said that Booth could shoot the British monster she guessed that he and Angel had gotten free.</p>
<p>Lucy blinked. “Huh?” she said.</p>
<p>“What?” Xander asked.</p>
<p>Lucy fell back as Buffy beat Spike into the ground with a plank of wood. Buffy let out a satisfied sigh. “You know, it’s good to be me.”</p>
<p>“Uh huh,” Lucy said. She looked at the crying costumed children around them. “Let’s get you guys home.”</p>
  </div><div class="fff_chapter_notes fff_foot_notes"><b>Notes for the Chapter:</b><blockquote class="userstuff">
          <p>This story gets really, really AU after this chapter.</p>
        </blockquote></div></div>
<a name="section0011"><h2>11. Lie to Me</h2></a>
<div class="story"><div class="userstuff module">
    
    <p>
  <strong>
    <em>Buffy</em>
  </strong>
</p>
<p>The top of a mausoleum wasn’t the most comfortable place in the world, but as the Slayer Buffy had gotten used to hanging out there. She had been lucky enough to not get injured during the whole Halloween costume fiasco on Friday (Xander had popped five stitches, Lucy’s ribs had gotten worse and Angel’s eardrums took three nights to heal), so crouching on top of the stone structure looking for vampires was the usual amount of uncomfortable, not complete torture.</p>
<p>A tugging in her gut had brought her to this end of the graveyard. A little boy standing inside the jungle gym at the playground was well within her sight but some Slayer sense told her that he wasn’t the demon she was here for. She looked over the graveyard again to make sure nothing was coming at her from behind and when she looked back at the playground the boy had been joined by a beautiful woman in a frilly white dress. From the way he was backing away from her, Buffy guessed that she wasn’t his mother. Nope, that woman was definitely a vampire.</p>
<p>Before she could make a move, a very familiar vampire appeared and stood between the boy and the vampire woman. Angel told the boy to run and the boy quickly listened, sprinting for the parking lot where a car was pulling in. The boy’s mother got out of the car and gave him a hug, fussing over him before they drove off.</p>
<p>Buffy knew that Angel could easily take care of one vampire, but as he and the woman stood and talked too quietly for her to hear she grew worried. They looked pretty cozy. Maybe what Spike had done to control Lucy at the gallery worked on other vampires too? Not likely. No, Angel was talking to this woman of his own free will.</p>
<p>Buffy might have stayed frozen on top of the mausoleum for the rest of the night if another girl hadn’t stepped between Angel and the woman. The girl turned her head to speak to Angel and Buffy saw that it was Lucy, wearing only her pajamas and a pair of sneakers. Buffy immediately stood up and jumped to the top of the jungle gym. Angel started slightly when she landed but the woman didn’t react at all.</p>
<p>“Pretty,” the woman said as she looked into Lucy’s eyes. “I see snowflakes.”</p>
<p>Before Buffy could move, the woman stepped forward and reached out to gently stroke Lucy’s cheek. After a few seconds she shifted into her game face and bit into Lucy’s neck.</p>
<p>Buffy jumped to the ground. She couldn’t collide with the vampire woman because she might have hurt her cousin even more. Angel was in her way trying to get the other vampire off of Lucy, so there wasn’t anything for Buffy to do but watch.</p>
<p>It felt like forever but it couldn’t have been more than a few seconds before Angel pulled the vampire woman off of Lucy and threw her across the playground. “Leave, now!” he growled.</p>
<p>The vampire woman picked herself up from where she had landed and ran away without looking back. Buffy didn’t even throw a stake after her because she was focused on Lucy. Her cousin’s legs had given way and she was lying on the grass staring at the sky. When Buffy knelt next to her she blinked and muttered something incoherent before passing out.</p>
<p>“Angel!” Buffy said.</p>
<p>Angel was at her side in an instant. “She hasn’t lost too much blood,” he muttered. “Let’s get her to my place and wait for her to wake up.” He picked Lucy up and started walking. Buffy went ahead of them, clearing their route of the vampires who were attracted by the fresh blood.</p>
<p>“I’ll get the door,” Buffy said once they arrived at Angel’s apartment.</p>
<p>“Thanks,” Angel said. Buffy followed him to the back of the apartment where he gently placed Lucy on his bed. “Do you want me to get you a chair?”</p>
<p>Buffy sat on the end of the bed. “I’ll be fine here. Are you gonna wait with me? Maybe tell me who did this to <em>my </em>cousin?”</p>
<p>Angel cleared his throat awkwardly and looked anywhere but at Buffy and Lucy. “If I told you I didn’t know...”</p>
<p>“I’d say your pants are on fire,” Buffy said. “I saw you talking to her. You guys looked like you were pretty close.”</p>
<p>“You could say that.” Angel was quiet for long enough that Buffy gave him a glarey face. “Drusilla is Spike’s sire. They’ve been together on and off, mostly on, for over a hundred years.”</p>
<p>“So you know her because you know Spike?”</p>
<p>Angel looked down at his shoes. “I know her because I made her who she is.”</p>
<p>Buffy’s stomach twisted. “You made her a vampire.”</p>
<p>Angel scoffed. “First I made her insane. I stalked her and killed her entire family, and when she joined a convent to get away from me I killed everyone there too. Then once she finally broke I made her a vampire so that my masterpiece would suffer forever.” His voice was filled with self-loathing.  </p>
<p>Buffy looked at her boyfriendy vampire. He still wasn’t looking at her. “Thank you for telling me. I know it must be painful so...thank you.”</p>
<p>Angel finally looked at her and gave a sad little smile. “You’re welcome.”</p>
<p>They sat in silence for a moment before Buffy noticed Lucy’s eyelids fluttering. “I think she’s waking up.”</p>
<p>Buffy was right. Lucy opened her eyes a few seconds later, looked at Angel, and closed them again. “Please tell me I didn’t set a faerie loose again.”</p>
<p>“No faeries,” Buffy said. “Just a whole lot of blood loss. We’re at Angel’s.”</p>
<p> “I’ll get you something,” Angel said. “Cookies and...is apple juice okay?”</p>
<p>“Do you have ginger ale?” Lucy asked with her eyes still closed. “Feeling kind of nauseous.”</p>
<p>“I’ll see what I can do,” Angel told her. He looked at Buffy before leaving the room.</p>
<p>Lucy opened her eyes and looked at Buffy. “Ask.”</p>
<p>“Ask what?” Buffy said.</p>
<p>“I can think of at least three questions,” Lucy said. “Ask.”</p>
<p>Well, since she had permission.</p>
<p>“Why were you out tonight?” Buffy asked. “What did you say to Angel? <em>Why didn’t you tell anyone about Drusilla?</em>”</p>
<p>“I thought I mentioned Drusilla. She was the one at the gallery. I guess I forgot,” Lucy said.</p>
<p>“Well, you were pretty out of it,” Buffy muttered. “But that’s no excuse! Drusilla is dangerous.”</p>
<p>“I know,” Lucy said. “She...she was calling me. I had to answer.”</p>
<p>“What?” Buffy asked. “How?”</p>
<p>“Psychic connection.”</p>
<p>That was...absolutely terrifying.</p>
<p>Buffy grabbed a handful of the comforter she was sitting on to prevent herself from doing any real damage to Lucy or Angel’s apartment. “So, Drusilla knows everything you’re thinking now?”</p>
<p>Lucy looked pained. “I don’t think so.”</p>
<p>“She doesn’t,” Angel said. He walked back into the room carrying a bag of chocolate chip cookies and a can of ginger ale with a straw. “Buffy, could I talk to Lucy in private for a minute?”</p>
<p>Buffy looked between her cousin and her sort-of-boyfriend. “Yeah, sure.”</p>
<p>Angel and Lucy talked for way longer than a minute. By the time they were done Buffy was pretty sure she’d paced a ditch into Angel’s floor. Angel stepped out of his room and Buffy immediately jumped on him.</p>
<p>“What’s going on? Is Lucy alright?”</p>
<p>“She’s sleeping,” Angel said. “You should call your mom. Tell her that Lucy was sleepwalking and we didn’t think that it was a good idea to carry her too far at night.”</p>
<p>“Good idea,” Buffy said. “Hope she believes me.”</p>
<p>Mom did believe her, though still being half asleep since she was woken in the middle of the night probably had more to do with that than Buffy’s skill with lying. She didn’t say a word when Buffy and Lucy walked through the front door a few minutes after sunrise, just got up from the chair where she had clearly been sitting waiting for them and headed back to bed.</p>
<p>Buffy didn’t see Lucy for the rest of the day. By the time she woke up from the one extra hour of sleep she was able to get, Lucy had already gone to school. When Buffy was in the library telling Giles about Drusilla and Lucy’s psychic connection to her, Lucy was nowhere to be found. Giles seemed worried and asked Buffy, Willow and Xander to tell Lucy that he needed to talk to her but then Ford showed up and Buffy forgot all about it until she got home and saw Lucy reading in the living room.</p>
<p>“Giles wants to talk to you,” Buffy said.</p>
<p>Lucy looked up at her. “I know. I went to the library after school.”</p>
<p>“Oh,” Buffy said. “So, where were you all day? We missed you.”</p>
<p>“In class.” Lucy looked back at her book. “I have my own friends, you know.”</p>
<p>“Willow and Xander are your friends too,” Buffy said. She sat down on the couch across from Lucy. “Are you still coming to the Bronze tonight? My friend Ford is going to be there, he transferred from Hemery.”</p>
<p>“Billy why-won’t-he-notice-me Fordham from like fifth grade?” Lucy asked. She smiled a little. “Well, I never got to threaten him properly. Sure, I’ll be there. I told the band about vampires.”</p>
<p>Buffy sat bolt upright on the couch. “What?”</p>
<p>“Don’t worry, I didn’t tell them about you,” Lucy said. “It’s for their safety. We got stalked by a vampire groupie again a few nights ago and with Drusilla having some freaky mind control over me...I was worried. Mr. Giles helped.”</p>
<p>“Oh,” Buffy said. “How’d they take it?”</p>
<p>“They took it well,” Lucy said. “Devon only threw up once and that was when I showed them proof.” She touched the side of her neck where Drusilla had bitten her.</p>
<p>“Okay,” Buffy said. “Do you want hot chocolate?”</p>
<hr/>
<p>When they got to the Bronze, Lucy took one look at Ford and slapped him across the face.</p>
<p>“Wow,” Xander said while Ford and Buffy looked at Lucy in bewilderment. “What was that for, so I don’t do whatever it was? Asking for a friend.”</p>
<p>“Lots of things,” Lucy said. “Mostly? Hurting Buffy. And if he even <em>thinks</em> about hurting her again he’ll get a lot worse.”</p>
<p>“Oh, no worries then,” Xander said. “Who wants drinks?”</p>
<p>“Me please,” Willow said. “Cherry soda.”</p>
<p>“Water, thanks Xander,” Lucy said.</p>
<p>“Lucy, can I talk to you?” Buffy said. She managed to wait until she and Lucy were in a more private corner of the club before exploding. “What was that about? Ford didn’t deserve that.”</p>
<p>Lucy shrugged. “Just doing the whole overprotective big sister bit. No real harm done, Buffy.”</p>
<p>“No,” Buffy said. “Ford is my friend. He’s never really hurt me and he never would.”</p>
<p>Also, Lucy was only three months older than her. That didn’t count as a big sister. </p>
<p>Lucy flinched. “Are you sure you know Ford as well as you think you do?”</p>
<p>Buffy clenched her fists and spoke through her teeth. “What’s that supposed to mean?”</p>
<p>“I mean that...” Lucy hesitated and shook her head. “You know what? Forget about it. Everything’s fine. This whole thing with Drusilla has got me on edge. I’m going to go home and get some sleep. Apologize to Ford for me?”</p>
<p>Lucy was out the door muttering something about loud people before Buffy could even think to say it was too dangerous to walk home alone. The fact that the club was nearly empty that early in the night probably helped.</p>
<p>“Where’s Lucy going?” Willow asked when Buffy rejoined her friends.</p>
<p>“Home,” Buffy said. “She’s tired. She said sorry for hitting you, Ford.”</p>
<p>Ford waved off the apology. “No worries. It didn’t hurt or anything.”</p>
<p>“A manly man,” Xander said. “Aren’t we lucky?”</p>
<p>“Should we go after her?” Willow asked. “Oh, hi, Angel. Remember what happened last time?”</p>
<p>Buffy spun around and nearly collided with Angel. “Angel! Hi! You didn’t say you were going to be here.”</p>
<p>Angel looked all scowly for a second. “I was talking with Spike. He met up with Lucy outside. She’ll be fine. Who are you?”</p>
<p>Ford jumped a little when Angel spoke to him. “Uh, I’m Billy Fordham, Buffy’s friend. You can call me Ford.”</p>
<p>He held out a hand for Angel to shake. Angel stared at him for a moment before shaking hands so quickly that he and Ford should have gotten friction burns.</p>
<p>Willow was muttering about how Spike had been what happened last time and while Angel was reassuring her Buffy dragged Xander and Ford onto the dance floor with a frown on her face. First Xander, then Lucy and now Angel? Why was Willow the only one who treated Ford normally? (Well, Xander’s treatment was normal for Xander but not for most other people.)</p>
<p>By the time Buffy had danced herself back into a good mood, Angel had pulled his usual disappearing act and Ford had retired to their table to regale Willow with embarrassing stories.</p>
<p>“Oh, don’t tell her about <em>that</em>,” Buffy said.</p>
<p>Ford grinned at her. “Would you rather I tell her about eighth grade—”</p>
<p>“Stop!” Buffy laughed and gave Ford a playful shove.</p>
<p>Willow and Xander looked at each other.</p>
<p>“We should probably go,” Willow said. “It’s getting late.”</p>
<p> “Yeah, we have the school stuff tomorrow,” Xander said, with horribly faked enthusiasm. “Don’t want to sleep through any of that.”</p>
<p>“You guys go ahead, I need some water,” Buffy said.</p>
<p>“I’ll wait with you,” Ford said. “You shouldn’t be walking alone at night.”</p>
<p>Buffy smiled. “I’ll be fine.”</p>
<p>“Well, maybe I want to spend more time with you,” Ford said.</p>
<p>Buffy froze. Her heart did a little flutter.</p>
<p>“Should we pretend I didn’t say that?” Ford asked quickly.</p>
<p>Yes. No. Yes, because Angel.</p>
<p>“I’m with Angel,” Buffy said.</p>
<p>“Well, yeah,” Ford said. “I meant as friends.”</p>
<p>“Friends.” Buffy nodded and went to get her drink.</p>
<hr/>
<p>The smile splitting Buffy’s face as she bounded into the library with Willow and Xander at the start of free period the next day could have lit up most of Sunnydale.</p>
<p>“So, will you tell us why you’re so happy now?” Xander asked. “Cause the grin is starting to freak me out.”</p>
<p>Buffy sat down on the checkout counter. “Not until Lucy gets here. I want everyone to hear this all at the same time.”</p>
<p>“Hear what?” Lucy asked as she stepped through the doors.</p>
<p>If it was possible, Buffy’s grin grew even wider. “Ford knows I’m the Slayer.”</p>
<p>There was a crash as Willow knocked over the stack of books she was building next to the computer. “What?”</p>
<p>“Oh dear lord,” Giles breathed.</p>
<p> “What?” Lucy echoed. “When did that happen?”</p>
<p>“Last night,” Buffy said. “I staked a vampire and he told me that he knew.”</p>
<p>“So...Why are you happy about this?” Xander asked.</p>
<p>Because Ford was her friend and now she didn’t have to lie to him. That was of the good.</p>
<p>Lucy made a sound of disgust. “Fine, don’t listen to me. If this comes back to bite you it’s not our fault.”</p>
<p>Buffy looked at Lucy with a frown. “But you said everything was fine.”</p>
<p>“Of course everything is fine,” Lucy said. “Why wouldn’t it be fine?”</p>
<p>“You did ditch us to spend time with Spike,” Xander pointed out.</p>
<p>Lucy blushed. “That was an accident. Mr. Giles, do you have any books about the Slayer during the Boxer Rebellion?”</p>
<p>Being asked about books seemed to snap Giles out of his shock. He put the book he was holding back on the shelf. “I believe there may be something that isn’t part of the Watchers Diaries. The translator of that one was more pompous and long-winded than usual. Why do you ask?”</p>
<p>Lucy’s faced turned even redder. “She was the first Slayer Spike killed. I was hoping to find something to help Buffy.”</p>
<p>Giles stared and then turned around, went to his office, and came back with a pile of books. “Do you know who the second one was?”</p>
<p>Lucy shook her head. “I think Spike’s trying not to tell me. The Chinese girl came up for a second last night and then he changed the subject.”</p>
<p>Giles and Lucy got into research mode with Giles’s pile of books while Willow gathered up her books and disappeared behind the computer.</p>
<p>“So, what exactly do you and Captain Peroxide talk about?” Xander asked. “Murder? Blood types? Crypt decorating?”</p>
<p>“Music,” Lucy said without looking up from the three books she had open in front of her. “Last night it was Pink Floyd versus the Sex Pistols. Pink Floyd won.”</p>
<p>“As they should,” Giles muttered.</p>
<p>“The Sex Pistols will win next time,” Lucy said. “Buffy? Xander? Are you gonna join the research party?”</p>
<p>“I’d love to help but I’ve got math homework that’s due in half an hour,” Xander said. “Help?”</p>
<p>Lucy sighed and put all but one of her books to the side. “Sit down and don’t bother Willow.”</p>
<p>With Lucy’s help Xander finished his math assignment before the next period started and Buffy got more than half of her English essay written. Willow hadn’t come up for air once and practically ran out of the library when the bell rang. Buffy wanted to ask her if she was okay but she didn’t get a chance to talk to her for the rest of the day, even in the classes they shared. All of their teachers seemed to be conspiring to cram as much information into their brains and homework into their backpacks as possible. Meanies.</p>
<p>Ford caught up with Buffy after school. He wanted to know if she had time to hang out that night and Buffy quickly agreed. Since he knew about her being the Slayer they could walk and talk and tour Sunnydale and he wouldn’t look at her funny if she had to run off to stake a vampire. They only ran into two vampires, by the high school, and Ford ended up staking one of them.</p>
<p>Buffy popped into the library after she and Ford split to let Giles know about the vampires. She’d recognized the one that Ford had staked as the only one of Spike’s minions that had survived the failed hostage exchange the night Lucy had come to Sunnydale. That made her think that Spike had some sort of plan going that Lucy couldn’t or wouldn’t tell them about.</p>
<p>Giles was in the library with Ms. Calendar. Buffy had a vague memory of the computer teacher mentioning a monster truck date after the Frankenstein thing. She hoped she wasn’t interrupting that. Thinking about Giles watching monster trucks was too much fun.   </p>
<p>“Oh, Buffy, thank god,” Giles said.</p>
<p>Ms. Calendar looked at him with a frown. “What’s that supposed to mean?”</p>
<p>It meant that Buffy had probably interrupted the monster truck date. That was a shame.</p>
<p>“Spike is up to something,” Buffy said. “I saw one of his minions outside. Ford staked her.”</p>
<p>Giles hurried away from Ms. Calendar to the table full of research. “I would say that’s a reasonable assumption given what Lucy has told me about Drusilla.”</p>
<p>“Drusilla?” Ms. Calendar asked.</p>
<p>“Spike’s sometimes paramour,” Giles said, adjusting his glasses as he looked through a book. “She was attacked in Prague and Spike has brought her here to heal her.”</p>
<p>“She didn’t look like she needs healing to me,” Buffy said. “She’s fast and strong.”</p>
<p>But that was compared to Lucy, a normal, vanilla-flavoured human. Angel had taken Drusilla down in seconds, but that wasn’t a fair comparison since he was older than her and should have been faster and stronger anyway.</p>
<p>“There are some nights when she can’t get out of bed, according to Lucy,” Giles said. “At least, I believe that’s what she said. She was getting rather difficult to understand by that time and I don’t think she meant for me to hear her.”</p>
<p>Before Buffy could ask Giles what he meant by that, there was a crash in Giles’s office and a blonde blur pushed past Buffy and Ms. Calendar and ran out of the library through the stacks. Buffy ran after her but was too late to stop her from escaping. She returned to where Giles was helping Ms. Calendar up off the floor with a frown on her face.</p>
<p>“That was the vampire Ford said he staked,” Buffy said. “And she was carrying one of your books.”</p>
<p>The look on Giles’s face was absolutely murderous. Buffy almost felt sorry for the vampire.</p>
<p>“Buffy, go straight home and tell Lucy to stay inside no matter what Drusilla does. She may be in danger. Stay with her. I’ll call you as soon as I figure out which book was taken,” Giles said.</p>
<p>“I’ll help you,” Ms. Calendar said.</p>
<p>Buffy hurried out of the library without a goodbye as Giles and Ms. Calendar started a search that would probably take all night. Giles had a lot of old, leather-bound books. She got home and called Giles almost immediately. “Lucy and my mom aren’t here.”</p>
<p>Staying put like Giles told her to do was difficult, but Buffy managed it by pacing around the house with a stake in her hand. A few minutes after calling Giles she realized that she should probably check if her mom was at the gallery and calmed down marginally after her mom told her that she was in her office working late. Giles, Ms. Calendar, Willow, Xander and Angel assembled in the living room in record time. Giles quickly filled everyone in on what had happened in the library and what they knew about Lucy and Drusilla. Then Angel dropped a bombshell.</p>
<p>“Ford is a member of a club of vampire worshippers,” he said, “the kind that want to become vampires.”</p>
<p>“They need someone to sire them, and right now Spike’s the biggest, baddest vamp on the Hellmouth,” Xander said. “Ford was probably getting info out of that vamp that he didn’t make dust.”</p>
<p>“But what about Lucy?” Willow asked. “Spike wouldn’t try a hostage exchange again, would he?”</p>
<p>Angel shook his head. “Not with Lucy. Drusilla, she has visions. If she saw Lucy telling Giles about her she might have decided to...take the problem out of the picture.”</p>
<p>Buffy gritted her teeth. “Not gonna happen. Angel, come with me to look for her?”</p>
<p>“No,” Angel said. “Lucy’s only in danger if she’s with Drusilla, so we’re going after Drusilla.”</p>
<p>“Great,” Xander said. “How?”</p>
<p>Angel looked uncomfortable. “I sired her. I can track her down. Come on.”</p>
<p>Ms. Calendar stayed behind in case Lucy made it home on her own and the rest of them followed Angel through the streets with weapons ready. They were headed towards the warehouse/factory district, because of course they were.</p>
<p>Angel came to a stop in front of a red brick and concrete building that looked exactly like all the other abandoned factories in the area. “Drusilla’s here. I think Spike is too. I smell blood, Lucy’s.”</p>
<p>“Well, what are we waiting for?” Xander asked, raising the ax he’d taken from Buffy’s weapons chest.</p>
<p>“A plan?” Willow suggested.</p>
<p>“No time,” Buffy said. “Angel, Giles and I will keep the vamps busy, you two get Lucy.”</p>
<p>Angel found the door and they burst through as loudly as they could. The vampires on the factory floor scattered.</p>
<p>“Does no one know what security is?” Spike shouted.</p>
<p>Buffy looked in the direction of his voice and saw him standing right across from the door on the second floor of the factory. He was shrouded in shadow and surrounded by stacks of crates. The only reason Buffy was sure it was him was because his hair was practically neon.</p>
<p>Spike stepped forward and locked eyes with Buffy. “Slayer.”</p>
<p>“Spike,” Buffy said.</p>
<p>Spike looked down at the vampires on the factory floor. “Well? Attack them!”</p>
<p>A dozen or so vampires sprang at Buffy, Angel and Giles. It felt like they were only fighting for a few seconds before Spike jumped into the fray and the tide started to turn in the vampires’ favour. Even Giles could mow down regular minions for ages, but Spike was a whole different story. His attacks hit far too close to home for Buffy’s comfort.  </p>
<p>“Stop!”</p>
<p>The whole battle froze and Buffy looked towards the shout. Lucy was standing by the table in the middle of the factory, leaning heavily on Xander. There was blood on her shirt.</p>
<p>“Spike, Buffy, back off,” Lucy said.</p>
<p>“Not a chance, kitten,” Spike said.</p>
<p>Buffy quickly looked back at him so that she wouldn’t be surprised by an attack. The table was on her left so she could almost see Lucy and Xander out of the corner of her eye.</p>
<p>“We have a deal, Spike,” Lucy said.</p>
<p>Spike scowled, showing his fangs and putting more wrinkles on his demon face. “A deal you broke.”</p>
<p>“I didn’t tell them anything that Mr. Giles’s books don’t have in them,” Lucy argued. “And I’ve read all of the ones about you and Drusilla. I should know.”</p>
<p>“I could have said as much as Lucy did,” Angel said from somewhere behind Buffy.</p>
<p>“Stay out of this, Peaches,” Spike growled. “Kitten, close your eyes.”</p>
<p>That was all the warning Buffy got before Spike attacked her again. She dodged the first punch and grabbed his arm to stop the second. Giles and Angel’s battle with the other vampires resumed seconds after. Buffy heard a shout from Giles and a thud from over by the table but she couldn’t take her eyes off Spike for a second. She twisted his arm and felt something break, but then he punched her in the gut with his other hand and she had to concentrate on not being eviscerated while she got her breath back. The peroxide blond vampire and the Slayer were matching each other hit for hit. The air was filling with dust that had been the minions fighting Giles and Angel.</p>
<p>Then there was another shout. “Hey, Spike! Back off or your girlfriend is dust!”</p>
<p>Willow was standing at the base of a staircase on the other side of the factory with Drusilla right in front of her. Drusilla was standing perfectly still with a look of fear on her face. Buffy looked at the stake that Willow was holding to Drusilla’s heart and grinned.</p>
<p>Spike immediately stepped back and called off his few remaining minions. There were still sounds of fighting that were explained when Buffy looked towards the table and saw Xander punching a very familiar dark-haired boy in the face. Ford hit the floor, dazed or unconscious, and Buffy felt a twinge in her chest that she mentally boxed up to deal with when they weren’t in the middle of a stand-off.    </p>
<p>“Don’t hurt her,” Spike said.</p>
<p>“We’re leaving with Lucy and Ford,” Willow said, her voice shaking only a little bit.</p>
<p>Spike hesitated. Drusilla whimpered.</p>
<p>“Take the dying annoyance,” Spike said. “The girl leaves when she wants.”</p>
<p>“You had her locked in the basement!” Xander said.</p>
<p>Buffy glared at Spike at that piece of information, but Spike wasn’t paying attention. He was staring at Lucy, who was propping herself up with the back of a chair and staring right back.</p>
<p>“Take Ford and go,” Lucy finally said.</p>
<p>“But—” Buffy, Xander and Willow said.</p>
<p>“Go. Now,” Lucy said. “I’ll be fine.”</p>
<p>Angel was the first to move. He picked up Ford and slung his limp form over one shoulder before coming to stand next to Buffy. Xander followed him. </p>
<p>“Willow, bring Drusilla here,” Angel said.</p>
<p>Willow prodded Drusilla forwards until they were standing a few feet from Spike.</p>
<p>“Give her to Spike and run,” Angel said.</p>
<p>With one push Drusilla was in Spike’s arms and Willow was sprinting for the exit. Xander and Angel quickly followed her. Buffy didn’t move. Lucy was still standing by the table, staring at Spike and Drusilla with a look on her face that Buffy couldn’t even begin to understand.</p>
<p>“Buffy, let’s go,” Giles said.</p>
<p>Buffy took one last look at her cousin before running with Giles out of the factory.</p>
<p>They went a few blocks before Ford began to stir. Angel dumped him on a bench and they all stood around him as he came to. Ford didn’t get a chance to say anything in his own defence before Buffy laid down the law.</p>
<p>“Take your vampire wannabe friends and get out of my town.”</p>
<p>Ford rubbed his head. He opened his mouth to say something.</p>
<p>“I don’t care,” Buffy said. “Whatever you have to say is probably a lie anyway. Leave.”</p>
<p>Buffy turned sharply and walked away with Willow and Xander close behind her.</p>
<hr/>
<p>When Buffy went downstairs the next morning, Lucy was sitting at the island in the kitchen, eating cereal and reading the obituaries in the local paper. She had somehow managed to get in and out of their bedroom without waking Buffy up. She hadn’t been home before Buffy fell asleep but she was currently wearing a pink turtleneck that came from Buffy’s side of the closet.</p>
<p>“Your mom’s at the gallery already,” Lucy said around a mouthful of cocoa puffed rice. “Some emergency she has to take care of before they can reopen.”</p>
<p>Buffy nodded and went to pour her own bowl of cereal. They sat together in silence until Lucy put down her spoon and rubbed a bruise on her wrist that looked very hand-like.</p>
<p>“Are you okay?” Buffy asked.</p>
<p>At exactly the same time, Lucy asked, “How are you?”</p>
<p>The two of them giggled.</p>
<p>“You first,” Lucy said. “Did Ford tell you why he was at the factory?”</p>
<p>Buffy shook her head. “Angel and Giles stayed behind to get it out of him, but I feel asleep before Giles called.”</p>
<p>Lucy looked like she’d been punched in the gut. “I...I didn’t want to be the one to tell you but...Ford wanted to make a trade. The Slayer and a bunch of people from somewhere called the Sunset Club in exchange for Spike making him a vampire.”</p>
<p>“Spike called him a dying annoyance,” Buffy said.</p>
<p>Lucy made a sound that could have been either agreement or sympathy. “Ford has terminal brain cancer. He found out about vampires and decided being sired was better than dying.”</p>
<p>“That’s...” Buffy shook her head. “That doesn’t excuse leading dozens of people to their deaths.”</p>
<p>“He thought that he didn’t have a choice.”</p>
<p>That wasn’t true. Ford had a choice. It wasn’t a good choice, but he had a choice.</p>
<p>“What would you have done if it were you?” Buffy asked.</p>
<p>Lucy drew circles on the newspaper with her finger. “I kind of like my soul where it is and death...isn’t unfamiliar.”</p>
<p>Buffy didn’t have to ask what Lucy meant by that.</p>
<p>“What happened to you after we left last night?” she asked instead. “You’re hurt.”</p>
<p>Lucy covered her wrist with one hand, which only made the shallow cuts and bruises on her other arm that her sleeve didn’t cover more visible. “What do you want me to say?”</p>
<p>“Lie to me.”</p>
<p>Lucy sighed. “Drusilla didn’t hurt me at all, and Spike and I had a calm, rational discussion where we decided that it would be better if we didn’t see each other anymore.”</p>
<p>Buffy got out of her seat and gave her cousin a hug. “Liar.”</p>
  </div></div>
<a name="section0012"><h2>12. Promises</h2></a>
<div class="story"><div class="userstuff module">
    
    <p>
  <strong>
    <em>Lucy</em>
  </strong>
</p>
<p>Sam pulled out the chair next to him as Lucy approached their regular lunch table. “You look better today,” he said.</p>
<p>Lucy sat down and put her tray on the table. “Isn’t that what every girl wants to hear?”</p>
<p>“Hey, I didn’t say you look awful,” Sam said.</p>
<p>“Again,” Soul said.</p>
<p>Devon put his tray down on the table across from Lucy. “What are we talking about?”</p>
<p>“Lucy,” Sam said.</p>
<p>Devon looked at her. “You look better today.”</p>
<p>Lucy groaned. “Was I really that bad yesterday?”</p>
<p>Sure, she’d spent half the night with Buffy and the gang chasing down a pack of fungus demons and then the other half of the night washing bits of fungus demon out of her hair, but that didn’t mean she looked like she’d spent half the night with Buffy and the gang chasing down a pack of fungus demons and then the other half of the night washing bits of fungus demon out of her hair.</p>
<p>Seriously, fungus demons were the worst.</p>
<p>Sam lowered his voice. “Was it, you know?” He mimed fangs in his neck using his middle and pointer fingers.</p>
<p>Lucy shook her head. “Worse. You’re better off not knowing.”</p>
<p>“Ominous,” Oz said.</p>
<p>Lucy found herself chuckling at Oz’s deadpan tone. There was nothing she knew of that could rattle him. When she’d told the guys that vampires were real he hadn’t even blinked.</p>
<p>“So, we’ve got a gig—” Devon said. Sam and Soul interrupted him with groans.</p>
<p>“Man, we played every night last week,” Sam said. “Don’t you have a date or something? Take Cordelia out dancing and let us have a break.”</p>
<p>Devon popped open his soda can. “I would do that if Cordelia hadn’t broken up with me and if every other girl at school didn’t think I was dating Lucy.”</p>
<p>Lucy choked on the last drop of apple juice she was trying to swallow. “What?” she asked after the ensuing coughing fit had died down.</p>
<p>Sam pointed first at Devon and then at Lucy. “Lead singer, only girl in the band. Not that hard to do the math.”</p>
<p>“But we’re not dating,” Lucy muttered. “People would know if we were dating.”</p>
<p>Not only was the gossip mill at Sunnydale High turned up to eleven, which was probably a good thing considering how often people got murdered, but people had always known only by looking about her and Quinn. It would have been annoying if they hadn’t wanted to tell everyone they met anyway. </p>
<p>As usual, thinking about Quinn was like a punch in the gut. Lucy looked down at her macaroni and cheese and concentrated on counting the noodles. She got to one-hundred and twenty before she didn’t feel like crying anymore. At that point, rejoining the conversation was a lesson in confusion.</p>
<p>“Wait, what’s happening?” Lucy asked.</p>
<p>“We’re going to go watch the swim team tryouts after school and put off band practice until tomorrow,” Devon said with a sigh. “Majority rules.”</p>
<p>“Isn’t it early for swim team?” Lucy asked.</p>
<p>“The coach is trying some new training program,” Sam said. He lowered his voice to add, “You in? Swim team guys are hot.”</p>
<p>Lucy looked at Oz. “What does the only straight person at the table say?”</p>
<p>Oz gave a microscopic shrug. “I can do homework.”</p>
<p>“You do homework?” Soul asked with wide eyes.</p>
<p>The image of a different pair of blue eyes surfaced in Lucy’s mind. She forced it away.</p>
<p>“I’m in,” she said. “I could use a distraction.”</p>
<p>Lucy had never been to the pool at Sunnydale High, probably because she spent most of her free time in the library. It looked like pools she’d seen photos of, tiled in white and blue with sliver railings straddling the edge of the water. There were wooden bleachers along one wall under several rows of windows. The Dingoes climbed up to the top row and settled in to do homework, cheer on the guys trying out for swim team, and talk about the swimmers they thought were attractive.</p>
<p>“That,” Sam said, nodding towards the boy doing the backstroke in lane eight, “is Cameron Walker. His sister was a total babe.”</p>
<p>Or tangentially attractive.</p>
<p>“Let me guess,” Lucy said. “She’s dead?”</p>
<p>“Yup,” Sam said. “She was really smart too. She got accepted to Harvard.”</p>
<p>Lucy sighed. That was just like Sunnydale, wasn’t it? “What was her name?”</p>
<p>“Julie, maybe?” Sam said.</p>
<p>Lucy’s stomach twisted. “Julia? Blonde, green eyes?”</p>
<p>Sam nodded. “Yeah, that’s her.”</p>
<p> “She’s a vampire.”</p>
<p>All four of the boys stopped what they were doing.</p>
<p>“Really?” Soul asked.</p>
<p>Lucy nodded.</p>
<p>“Damn,” Devon said.</p>
<p>It was more like damned for eternity, but Devon was pretty much right.</p>
<p>Lucy started on the list of questions they had for the chapters of <em>Lord of the Flies </em>that they were supposed to have read that week (which she had nearly finished before the fungus demon incident and not gotten back to until the beginning of English class). She got to the second one before laughter and cheers from the boys at the poolside distracted her.  There was a splash as two of the boys dove into the pool and raced to the other side...using a stroke that made them look like squid. The boy who made it too the other side first pumped his fist in the air and made a funny fish face with his hands acting as gills.</p>
<p>“Who’s that?” Lucy asked, nodding towards fish boy.</p>
<p>Devon raised an eyebrow. “That’s Jim Drake. He’s in our biology class.”</p>
<p>“Oh,” Lucy said. “Really?”</p>
<p>“He sits at the back and doesn’t answer any questions,” Sam said.</p>
<p>“Oh,” Lucy said.</p>
<p>He also probably didn’t use the library, like 99.9% of Sunnydale High students. That explained why she had no idea who he was.</p>
<p>Lucy looked back at the pool. Jim was grinning while the coach chewed the boys out for not being serious. When he, the boy he’d beaten in the squid race and another boy were ordered back into the pool to do the backstroke properly, Jim looked up at the bleachers and winked.</p>
<p>“Did Jim wink at Lucy?” Soul asked.</p>
<p>“I saw that,” Sam said. “Devon?”</p>
<p>“I wasn’t looking,” Devon said. “Oz?”</p>
<p>Oz shrugged.</p>
<p>“He could have been winking at one of you,” Lucy said.</p>
<p>Sam chuckled. “Not a chance. That guy’s so straight he put an ad for a girlfriend in the paper, and I don’t mean the school paper.”</p>
<p>“Pretty sure that was a dare,” Soul said under his breath.</p>
<p>“Meh,” Sam said with a shrug. “Hey, Oz? Is the answer to this fifty-seven?”</p>
<p>Oz briefly looked at the line on the page that Sam was pointing to. “Thirty-two.”</p>
<p>Sam muttered a curse and erased half of his work.</p>
<p>They started packing up a few minutes after swim tryouts ended. Sam and Soul were talking about a movie they wanted to see (as a date, Lucy hoped) while Devon rambled to Oz and Lucy about a new song he wanted to write, having apparently been inspired by the history essay he was writing. Oz nodded every few seconds and Lucy made noises of agreement, even though neither of them could understand what he was saying (well, maybe Oz could, but Lucy was lost). They’d get the lyrics and the sheet music soon. For now it was easier to let him talk.</p>
<p>Lucy put her unfinished English homework back in her binder and tried to get the binder into her backpack. Somehow the binder wouldn’t fit behind the textbook-sized translation of a Kelper demon epic she’d borrowed from Mr. Giles for a bit of light reading, even though everything had fit perfectly when she’d been at her locker.</p>
<p>“Give me a minute,” she told the guys.</p>
<p>Apparently only Oz heard her. He helped her with her uncooperative (admittedly overstuffed) backpack while Sam, Soul and Devon continued down the bleachers. By the time they got all the books and papers in a position that allowed the zipper to close, Sam, Soul and Devon were nearly at the door and the swim team hopefuls were trickling out of the changing room.</p>
<p>Lucy hoisted her bag over her shoulders and she and Oz hurried to catch up with their friends. Well, Lucy hurried, Oz strolled quickly in a very unhurried way. How he managed to do that was a question best left to scientists and whatever magic researchers were called. Magitists?  </p>
<p>At the bottom of the bleachers, Lucy nearly tripped over a flustered-looking Jim Drake. She credited her experience with walking after recent blood loss for helping her catch her balance with barely a wobble.</p>
<p>“Hi,” Jim said. “Lucy, right?”</p>
<p>“Yeah,” Lucy said. “Hi.”</p>
<p>“Hi,” Jim said. He chuckled awkwardly. “I said that already, didn’t I?”</p>
<p>Lucy nodded. “You kinda did.”</p>
<p>“Yeah...” Jim rubbed the back of his head, making his wet hair stand on end. “Do you want to go on a date? With me?”</p>
<p>Lucy was shocked into silence. Her lips twitched open and closed a few times but she couldn’t make any words come out.</p>
<p>Jim spoke quickly. “I mean, you don’t have to. Do you want to think about it? We can talk tomorrow when you’ve had time to think. This was stupid anyway, asking you now. I smell like chlorine and the guys—”</p>
<p>“What time?” Lucy finally blurted out. “I mean, when were you thinking?”</p>
<p>“Are you free tonight?” Jim asked.</p>
<p>“I should be,” Lucy said. Devon would probably be holed up working on his new song for the next few days and, aside from helping Buffy with slaying, <em>other</em> vampire things were unlikely to be an issue.</p>
<p>Jim nodded. “Cool. Great. Do you like dancing? We could meet up at the Bronze. Sixish?”</p>
<p>“Yeah, sure. Six.”</p>
<p>Jim smiled. “Six. Looking forward to it.”</p>
<p>“Yeah.”</p>
<p>As Jim walked out the doors, Lucy looked at Oz with wide eyes. “What just happened?”</p>
<p>Oz shrugged.</p>
<hr/>
<p>Buffy’s reaction to finding out that Lucy had a date was easily predictable. Dragging Lucy to their closet to choose an outfit came after the high-pitched squeal but before finding concealable weapons that Lucy could use in case her date turned out to be a demon that wanted to eat her. Aunt Joy resigned herself to washing the dishes on her own and told Lucy that she’d be waiting up for her so she’d better be home before ten.</p>
<p>The outfit that Buffy put together consisted of a mint green t-shirt and black miniskirt with Lucy’s Black Canary boots (plus a knife in one boot and a thin stake in the other).</p>
<p>“It says not easy but still fun,” Buffy said.</p>
<p>“It says I’m going to freeze if the temperature dips below sixty,” Lucy countered.</p>
<p>Buffy smiled. “And that means he’ll have to lend you his jacket. Now sit down so I can do your makeup.”</p>
<p>Lucy rolled her eyes and complied.</p>
<p>It was already past sunset, so Buffy walked with Lucy to the Bronze. She would do a quick patrol before heading home and sneaking out to do a more thorough cemetery sweep. Mr. Giles wasn’t expecting trouble so soon after the fungus demons, but the Hellmouth liked to defy expectations on occasion. It was better for Buffy to patrol properly.</p>
<p>Jim was waiting for Lucy outside of the club. He greeted her with a smile and they went inside. The Bronze was filled with people, as per usual for every night of the week. They got some drinks and managed to find a table on the second floor. They planned to talk a little, finish their drinks and then go dance when the band had finished warming up. What happened instead was that Lucy and Jim talked, and talked, and talked. Jim told Lucy about his collection of comic books and how he was secretly a fan of *NSYNC. Lucy told Jim about her love of Green Day and how her Aunt Joy’s brownies were the best dessert in the world. They found out that they both wanted to visit New York City someday, though Jim was mostly interested in the Empire State Building while Lucy wanted to see absolutely everything the city had to offer.</p>
<p>They kept talking long past their drinks being finished and the dance floor filling up. Laughing at a joke Jim had made, Lucy felt... absolutely nothing. Nothing, except for the massive headache that was trying to make her eyes burst out of her skull.</p>
<p>Lucy kept a smile on her face and said, “I need to get some air. Not trying to ditch you, promise. It’s getting crowded in here, that’s all.”</p>
<p>Jim stood up with her. “Mind if I come with you? I could use some air myself.”</p>
<p>Lucy let out a sigh as they walked into the night air. Her headache hadn’t faded much once there were walls between her and the people in the Bronze, but it was so bad that even a little bit made a difference.</p>
<p>“It is hot in there,” Jim said. “You want to walk for a bit?”</p>
<p>“Sure.”</p>
<p>They walked past the people smoking, drinking, and chatting outside of the club. As they travelled further from the relative safety of the group, Lucy kept more of an eye out for anything that might be hunting for a snack. She was so busy looking for monsters that it took her completely by surprise when Jim turned around and leaned against the wall of the club, blocking her path.</p>
<p>“Did I tell you how hot you look?”</p>
<p>Lucy shrugged. “You might have.”</p>
<p>Jim chuckled. “You look hot.”</p>
<p>“Thanks...”</p>
<p>Jim stepped forward and kissed her. His lips were too warm and Lucy was frozen in place. The whole thing was uncomfortable even before his hands went under her skirt and t-shirt.</p>
<p>Lucy broke off the kiss and tried to back away from him. “Jim, stop it!”</p>
<p>Jim pulled her towards him. “Aw, don’t be like that, babe.”</p>
<p>Her arms were pinned against Jim’s chest, so Lucy aimed a kick at Jim’s ankles. It was on target but Jim still didn’t let her go. He forced another kiss on her, groping at her breasts.</p>
<p>Lucy bit his tongue.</p>
<p>Jim finally let her go. He backed away from her, spitting blood on the ground. He didn’t go far and there was a dumpster behind her, but Lucy was sure that she had enough room to take him down with one of Black Canary’s moves so that she could get away. Not for the first time she mourned the loss of Dinah Laurel Lance’s sonic scream.</p>
<p>Jim bared his teeth. “Guess you like it rough.”</p>
<p>“Get out of my way,” Lucy said.</p>
<p>Jim laughed and came closer. “What? Can’t I get something out of a boring date?”</p>
<p>“You seemed fine with just talking,” Lucy snapped. “Back off.”</p>
<p>“Well, isn’t this cozy,” a very familiar voice said.</p>
<p>Spike was standing a few feet away from Lucy and Jim. Lucy met his eyes and she felt her body relax.  </p>
<p>“Keep walking, pal,” Jim said.</p>
<p>Spike narrowed his eyes at him. “The lady told you to stop. Scram.”</p>
<p>Jim didn’t move. Then Spike let out an inhuman growl and the boy ran away so quickly that he should have left scorch marks on the asphalt.</p>
<p>“Bloody bastard,” Spike muttered. “You alright, kitten?”</p>
<p>Lucy nodded and rubbed her arms, suddenly cold. “What are you doing here? No, wait, don’t tell me. I don’t want to know who you killed.”</p>
<p>Spike looked at her. He took off his coat and put it over her shoulders. “Let’s get you home, luv.”</p>
<p>They walked an entire block in silence. Lucy held Spike’s coat around her and breathed in the smell of the leather.</p>
<p>“I’ve missed you,” Spike said.</p>
<p>“I thought you didn’t want to see me.” Lucy looked down at her feet. “I yelled at you, you yelled at me, I cried all over your shirt.”</p>
<p>“I wasn’t exactly thinking straight, what with Dru being in danger,” Spike said. “I can’t lose her, Lucy.”</p>
<p>“I know.” Drusilla was his reason for existing. Lucy knew that.</p>
<p>“Don’t want to lose you either.”  </p>
<p>Lucy stopped walking and turned to face Spike. “Do you? You tried to kill Buffy. You told me to close my eyes and you tried to kill Buffy right in front of me.”</p>
<p>Spike gritted his teeth. “So? She’s the Slayer. I kill Slayers. You ought to know.”</p>
<p>She knew. She’d seen him kill Xin Rong, the Chinese Slayer active from December 1898 to June 1900. He was so damn happy every time he thought about killing Buffy.</p>
<p>“That doesn’t mean you have to rub it in.” Lucy let out a sudden, strangled laugh. She was arguing with a vampire about the proper etiquette around killing her cousin. How was this her life?</p>
<p>It took a little while for Lucy to stop laughing. There wasn’t anything funny about any of it, except there was because the whole thing was so absolutely stupid. She took a few deep breaths. Tonight was not her night.</p>
<p>“You alright?” Spike asked.</p>
<p>“Do you care?”</p>
<p>Spike averted his eyes for a split second. “Of course I care.”</p>
<p>They looked at each other, quiet.</p>
<p>“Spike?” Lucy murmured.</p>
<p>“Yeah, kitten?”</p>
<p>“Walk me home?”</p>
<p>Spike put an arm around her shoulders and gently kissed her forehead. “I’d be happy to.”</p>
<hr/>
<p>The next day was Lucy’s birthday. She didn’t realize that she was seventeen until she walked downstairs and Aunt Joy said happy birthday to her.</p>
<p>“I’m so sorry. We’ve all been so busy that I haven’t even asked you what you want to do today,” Aunt Joy said.</p>
<p>“It’s okay,” Lucy said. “We don’t have to do anything special.”</p>
<p>Aunt Joy clapped her hands together. “Tell you what. I’m going to make all your favourites for dinner tonight, and brownies.”</p>
<p>“Aunt Joy!” Lucy gave her a hug. “You don’t have to.”</p>
<p>“But I want to.” Aunt Joy smiled and Lucy smiled back.</p>
<p>Lucy’s not bad mood lasted until she was at her locker at the start of lunch. Three boys that she recognized from swim team tryouts were two lockers down from her. When they saw her they grinned.</p>
<p>“Does he always share?” one of the boys asked. The other two laughed.</p>
<p>“What?” Lucy said.</p>
<p>“Devon,” the boy said. “Does he always share you or did Jim get a one-time deal?”</p>
<p>Lucy’s face grew hot. She shut her locker a bit harder than she should have. “You must be confused.”</p>
<p>The boys just laughed and walked away, leaving Lucy fuming. She didn’t have to be a mind-reader to know what those boys were implying and she was willing to bet that one person had been the source of their false information.</p>
<p>Soul signed Jim’s death warrant when he ran into Lucy (literally) on their way to the cafeteria and blurted out that Jim had been telling anyone who would listen that Lucy had sex with him.</p>
<p>“She didn’t need to know that, Soul,” Sam grumbled.</p>
<p>Soul’s face was as red as his hair.</p>
<p>“I had an inkling,” Lucy said through her teeth.</p>
<p>Sam opened the cafeteria door right in time for them to see Devon punching Jim in the chest so hard that Jim fell backwards out of his chair and flew three feet before hitting the floor. They stood in the door and stared for a few seconds before Sam jumped in and clocked Jim in the jaw as he was starting to stand up. He hit the floor again and was either dazed or making the wise decision to stay down, not that that helped him when Devon hoisted him up by his shirt and started punching him in the face repeatedly. One of Jim’s friends tried to pull Devon off of him and got attacked by Sam for his trouble.</p>
<p>Soul groaned. “Snyder is going to kill them.”</p>
<p>Lucy squared her shoulders and marched through the handful of onlookers. “Devon, drop him. His brain is useless enough without you damaging it.”</p>
<p>Devon stopped hitting Jim for a moment, breathing hard and glaring at the other boy’s bloodied face. Then he let go of his shirt and watched him drop to the floor.</p>
<p>It was then that Oz arrived. He looked from Jim to Devon to across the room where Soul was wrestling Sam away from Jim’s friend and raised an eyebrow.</p>
<p>“Long story,” Lucy said.</p>
<p>She crouched down next to Jim, who was groaning quietly. He blinked a few times and his eyes focused on her face. His lips curled into a bloody snarl. “Bitch.”</p>
<p>Lucy tilted her head. “You’re gonna die.”</p>
<p>Jim’s mouth dropped open. “Are you...threatening me?”</p>
<p>“Stating a fact.” Lucy locked eyes with him. “Seeing as this is Sunnydale, I’m betting you’ll be in the ground sooner rather than later, and when you are I promise you I’ll be around to spit on your grave.”</p>
<p>Snyder did not kill Devon or Sam. He did however suspend them and Jim’s friend for five days for fighting. He tried to punish Soul, Oz and Lucy too but there were too many people who had seen what actually happened for him to pretend that they had gotten physically involved. He had to settle for glaring at them.</p>
<p>Lucy lasted ten seconds after leaving Snyder’s office before she stopped and asked Devon and Sam what the hell they’d been thinking.</p>
<p>“I was helping Devon,” Sam said quickly.</p>
<p>Lucy looked at Devon. He shifted his weight from foot to foot.</p>
<p>“Well?” Lucy asked.</p>
<p>“I don’t like it when people spread lies about my friends,” Devon grumbled.</p>
<p>“You should have seen what he did when Larry kept saying that Soul killed the class hamster,” Sam said.</p>
<p>Soul blushed. “That was in third grade.”</p>
<p>“What about when—” Soul cut Sam off by elbowing him in the gut.    </p>
<p>Buffy, Willow and Xander wanted to know what happened as soon as Lucy walked into the library after school. After she’d finished explaining what had led up to the fight, Buffy looked like she wanted to beat up Jim herself and Mr. Giles seemed to be trying to polish his glasses into the opposite prescription.</p>
<p>“That is not at all appropriate,” Mr. Giles said.</p>
<p>“Weren’t you ever a teenage boy, G-man?” Xander asked. “Oh, wait, I forgot. You’re British.”</p>
<p>Buffy and Willow glared at Xander, who held up his hands. “I’m not defending them even though it sounds like I’m defending them and I’ll be over here.” He disappeared into the stacks.</p>
<p>By mutual agreement, Lucy and Buffy did not mention the fight at all when they got home. Aunt Joy was in a ridiculously happy mood and after all the stress she had been going through with the gallery lately they did not want to spoil it. The house smelled like baking brownies and it was all too easy to relax into the warmth of a home-cooked dinner and push aside all the bad stuff that had happened in the past few months.</p>
<p>“Aunt Joy, you are absolutely amazing,” Lucy said as she finished off the whipped cream dolloped brownie on her plate.</p>
<p>Buffy licked whipped cream off of her spoon. “Mmmm. No arguments here.”</p>
<p>Aunt Joy smiled. “Thank you, girls.”</p>
<p>They all turned to look when the doorbell rang.</p>
<p>“I’m not expecting anyone,” Aunt Joy said. “Buffy? Lucy?”</p>
<p>Both girls shook their heads.</p>
<p>Aunt Joy got up from the table and went to answer the door. “Hello, William. How are you? Come inside.”  </p>
<p>Buffy and Lucy looked at each other. Buffy’s face showed clear panic and Lucy thought that she probably wasn’t much better. They practically ran to the front door. Buffy knocked over her chair and caught it before it could put a hole in the wall.</p>
<p>Spike and Aunt Joy were exchanging pleasantries in the front hall.</p>
<p>“Happy birthday, Lucy,” Spike said as soon as he saw them. “Hi, Buffy.”</p>
<p>Buffy crossed her arms. “What are you doing here?”</p>
<p>“Well, uh...” Spike riffled through the pockets of his coat and came out with a plastic cassette case with a green ribbon tied in a bow around it. “Presents.”</p>
<p>Lucy untied the ribbon and read the label on the cassette tape. “‘The Best Music in the World’? Somehow I doubt you put the Spice Girls on this.”</p>
<p>Spike grinned. “Give it a listen. I might surprise you.”</p>
<p>Buffy coughed quietly. Spike looked at her for a second before turning back to Aunt Joy. “Drusilla decided that she wanted to have a birthday party for Lucy. I’ve been sent to fetch her. Just an hour or two? I’ll get her back home as soon as Dru won’t notice she’s gone.”</p>
<p>Aunt Joy looked at Lucy. “Lucy? It’s your birthday.”</p>
<p>It was her birthday and Lucy would rather have stayed in and watched movies with Buffy and Aunt Joy. It would also be her fault if Drusilla got upset and decided to come murder Aunt Joy on one of her good nights.</p>
<p>“It won’t be long.” Lucy forced a smile on her face. “How can I say no to Drusilla?”</p>
<p>Spike had the decency to look uncomfortable.</p>
<p>The majority of the minions remaining after Buffy, Angel, Willow, Xander and Mr. Giles had stormed the castle were standing around the table in the centre of the factory floor when Lucy and Spike arrived. Drusilla was sitting at the head of the table. She smiled when she saw Lucy.</p>
<p>“Sing!” Drusilla ordered.</p>
<p>The vampire minions broke into an off-key rendition of <em>Happy Birthday</em>. Drusilla applauded when they were finished and they followed her lead.</p>
<p>“Our Spike got you a birthday cake,” Drusilla said to Lucy. “Make a wish.”</p>
<p>Spike lit the candy cane striped candle in the centre of the chocolate-frosted cake with his lighter. Lucy stared at the flame.</p>
<p>
  <em>I wish I were safe.</em>
</p>
<p>The thought sprung suddenly into her head. Lucy blinked once before blowing the candle out. It was a selfish wish, but it was her birthday, damn it. She could be selfish today.</p>
<p>Spike cut slivers of cake and Lucy passed them out to the waiting vampires. Dalton, a man with glasses and fashion sense out of the 1920s, said thank you very politely and got growled at by Spike for his trouble. One of the other minions started playing the fiddle and Drusilla clapped while several of the vampires danced. Lucy watched the dancing for a while. Then, almost without her input, she turned and her feet took her down the stairs to Spike and Drusilla’s room. She stopped at the base of the stairs and stared at a specific spot on the other side of the bed.</p>
<p>Soon, Lucy heard someone else’s footsteps coming down the stairs. She didn’t bother moving. There was only one person who would be coming after her.</p>
<p>“She’s acting like nothing happened,” Lucy said. “It’s like she doesn’t remember.”</p>
<p>Lucy remembered. Things got a bit fuzzy after Drusilla threw her into the wall, but she remembered how it felt when Drusilla dug her nails into her skin and cut bloody swaths into her shoulders. She remembered Drusilla whispering sweetly while she immobilized Lucy’s arms in such a tight grip that it was a surprise that bones hadn’t broken. She remembered the hot, wild panic of not being able to get away.  </p>
<p>Spike put a hand on her shoulder. “That’s Dru’s way, kitten. She can forget an awful lot when she wants to.”</p>
<p>Lucy’s gaze moved from the spot on the wall where she could spot a rusty smear of dried blood to the floor underneath it, which was covered by a carpet that hadn’t been there last time. It was probably hiding bloodstains on the concrete.</p>
<p>“I can see that.”</p>
<p>Lucy turned and buried her face in Spike’s shirt. She didn’t cry, not like the last time, but Spike still rubbed circles on her back while she breathed in and out and tried to get her heart rate back to normal.</p>
<p>“I’ve got another present for you,” Spike said nonchalantly. “Didn’t think Joyce would think too well of me if I gave it to you earlier.”</p>
<p>“Quit trying to distract me with something shiny,” Lucy mumbled into Spike’s chest. Being a vampire, Spike heard her anyway.</p>
<p>“How’d you know it was shiny?” he asked with a smile in his voice. “What could it be? Come on, you know you’re curious.”</p>
<p>Lucy chuckled. “You’re terrible.” She looked up at Spike. “Fine. What is it? A pretty knife? A human heart?”</p>
<p>“Organs were always more Angelus’s style,” Spike said. “A knife though...Well, maybe next time. Close your eyes.”</p>
<p>Lucy glared at him silently. She didn’t need to remind him what had happened last time he’d said that.</p>
<p>Spike huffed. “Don’t close your eyes then.”</p>
<p>Spike took her right hand and a cool weight slipped onto her ring finger. He held up her hand to show her the ring, a little silver snake with the end of its tail in its mouth whose jewelled eyes were either black or a very dark green. It was quite pretty.     </p>
<p>“It’s an ouroboros,” Spike said. “It means forever. Eternal life.”</p>
<p>Lucy swallowed, her throat suddenly dry. “Poetic.”</p>
<p>“It’s a promise.” Spike kissed the back of Lucy’s hand right above the ring. “I’m going to give you forever.”</p>
  </div></div>
<a name="section0013"><h2>13. Visitors and the Dark Age</h2></a>
<div class="story"><div class="userstuff module">
    
    <p>
  <strong>
    <em>Lucy</em>
  </strong>
</p>
<p>The words on the page in front of Lucy were doing cartwheels. She couldn’t even tell what language they were. Maybe the book was cursed. It was a second-hand copy of <em>The Hound of the Baskervilles</em> though, so that was probably unlikely. Probably.</p>
<p>Lucy closed the book with a sigh. Across the room, Aunt Joy stopped dusting picture frames and looked over at the couch where Lucy was sitting.</p>
<p>“That was a very heavy sigh. Is something wrong?” Aunt Joy asked.</p>
<p>“No...Sort of,” Lucy said.</p>
<p>Aunt Joy looked concerned. “Do you want to talk about it?”</p>
<p>Did she? Lucy shrugged and drew circles on the cover of her book with her fingertip.</p>
<p>“Does it have something to do with William?” Aunt Joy asked.</p>
<p>Lucy looked up at her with wide eyes. “How...?”</p>
<p>Aunt Joy put down the feather duster and went to sit next to Lucy. “Well, I saw how the two of you were looking at each other last night. And I’m sure there’s a reason Buffy doesn’t seem happy with him.”</p>
<p>Lucy chuckled. “Understatement of the century.”</p>
<p>Aunt Joy laughed too. “Yes, well...Are you happy?”</p>
<p>“I...” Lucy looked down at her hand where she’d worn the ring Spike had given her until she went home.</p>
<p>Was she happy?</p>
<p>“I don’t know. Maybe. Sometimes.”</p>
<p>Aunt Joy patted her shoulder. “Sometimes is better than never.”</p>
<p>The doorbell rang. Lucy felt her heartbeat speed up, even though she knew full well that Spike wouldn’t be coming around during the day. Aunt Joy went to answer the door while Lucy peered out the window to see who it was. As soon as she spotted the visitor’s face, Lucy hurried to join her aunt at the door.</p>
<p>“Cassandra! What are you doing here?” Lucy asked.</p>
<p>“The job that Sunnydale Child Services couldn’t be bothered to do, apparently,” the caseworker said grimly. “You were supposed to have someone come check on you a week ago.”</p>
<p>“Should I have been notified?” Aunt Joy asked. “I didn’t hear anything about that.”</p>
<p>Cassandra stepped inside, muttering about incompetence and didn’t those people care about kids?</p>
<p>“You haven’t met the principle at Sunnydale High, have you?” Lucy asked. After Snyder, Sunnydale Child Services not putting in any effort wasn’t a surprise.</p>
<p>Aunt Joy closed the door. “Do you know who was supposed to come by?”</p>
<p>Cassandra opened her bag and took out a file folder. She flipped through the papers inside it for a moment before saying, “Someone called Stanley Stanley.”</p>
<p>Lucy recognized that name immediately. “He died two weeks ago.”</p>
<p>Cassandra looked at her with raised eyebrows. “How do you know that?”</p>
<p>Lucy shrugged. “He was in the obits. I remember because his name was kind of funny.”</p>
<p>“Well, that explains a lot.” Cassandra sighed. “If you’ll let me take a quick look around, Joyce, I can do the paperwork and get out of your hair.”</p>
<p>“That’s no problem,” Aunt Joy said. “Would you like coffee?”</p>
<p>Buffy was still asleep, so Cassandra walked through the first floor with Aunt Joy before they tiptoed upstairs. Lucy stayed out of their way by finishing the dusting Aunt Joy had needed to abandon and then trying to read her book, which her brain still didn’t seem to want to process despite the fact that she’d read it at least five times before.</p>
<p>“I’d like to talk to Lucy for a bit,” Cassandra said as she and Aunt Joy came back downstairs. “Alone, if you please.”</p>
<p>“I’ll go make another pot of coffee.” Aunt Joy darted out of the room.</p>
<p>Cassandra sat in a chair across from Lucy and folded her hands together in front of her. “How are you, Lucy?”</p>
<p>“I’m managing,” Lucy said. “Aunt Joy and Buffy have been great, and I’ve made some friends at school.”</p>
<p>“That’s good.” Cassandra looked at Lucy, her mouth set in a serious line. “Have you made the follow-up appointments your doctor recommended?”</p>
<p>Lucy bit her lip. “It’s on my to-do list.” Truthfully, everything going on with Sunnydale’s supernatural side had taken up all of her time that wasn’t devoted to school or the band. She wasn’t supposed to go for a follow-up for at least another week though, so she still had time.</p>
<p>Cassandra frowned. “You need to take care of yourself, Lucy.”</p>
<p>“I know.”</p>
<p>“You can’t neglect your health.”</p>
<p>“I know.”</p>
<p>“Some vampire has made you practically anemic already,” Cassandra muttered.</p>
<p>“I know,” Lucy said.</p>
<p>There was a pause and then they both asked, “Wait, what?”  </p>
<p>“You know about vampires?” Lucy asked.</p>
<p>“I could ask you the same question,” Cassandra said.</p>
<p>Lucy gestured towards the window. “Sunnydale is vampire central. It’s kind of hard to live in this town without running into them, though remembering them is another story. What’s your excuse?”</p>
<p>“I’d be a pretty poor witch if I didn’t know vampires are real,” Cassandra said. “And from what I’m seeing in your aura you’ve had more than a run-in with one. You’ve lost so much energy I’m surprised you can sit up straight.”</p>
<p>Lucy bit back a retort. Cassandra was only doing her job, even if she was going above and beyond to make sure that Lucy was all right. That wasn’t a good reason for Lucy to be defensive.</p>
<p>Cassandra looked Lucy over. “Seems pretty recent too.”</p>
<p>“Tuesday,” Lucy admitted. “There was this whole thing.” She shook her head as if she didn’t know how to explain it.</p>
<p>Cassandra’s eyes narrowed. “Is that all?”</p>
<p>“There were lives at risk,” Lucy said. “And I was perfectly safe aside from the whole bloodsucking thing.”</p>
<p>“Humph,” Cassandra grumbled. “What were you doing, playing bait?”</p>
<p>Well, in a manner of speaking, yes. But Lucy wasn’t going to tell her that.</p>
<p>Lucy was saved by Buffy coming down the stairs in her pajamas, blinking a few times and then asking, “Why’s she here?”</p>
<p>“Sunnydale Child Services sucks,” Lucy said.</p>
<p>Buffy tilted her head. “Somehow I am not surprised. Willow’s on the phone for you. She says it’s urgent.”</p>
<p>Lucy looked at Cassandra, who sighed and told her she could go. Lucy ran upstairs before she could change her mind, caught herself on the railing when she felt dizzy for a few seconds and went to talk to Willow.</p>
<p>Willow had a translation she was doing for Mr. Giles that referred to one of the manuscripts Lucy was reading. Lucy found the book and answered each of Willow’s questions, which took more than four hours since she had to translate back and forth between Etruscan and English while Willow bounced between Latin, Ancient Greek and English. By the time they figured everything out they had both missed lunch and Lucy was sure that if they’d had to go on any longer she wouldn’t have been able to concentrate.</p>
<p>“Thanks so much, Lucy!” Willow said. “I was sure this was about Buffy, but for once it isn’t. Yay us!”</p>
<p>Lucy smiled. “Looks like. You should probably double-check with Mr. Giles, but I definitely think it’s ‘Charmed Ones’ not ‘Chosen One’, though my plurals might be off.”</p>
<p>“Doesn’t matter!” Lucy could practically hear Willow grin through the phone. “It’s not for a year anyway and I can finally do my math homework. Thanks again!”</p>
<p>“No problem.” Lucy hung up the phone and stretched her arms over her head. Hopefully that was one less prophecy for them to worry about.</p>
<p>She stood up and the world went black.</p>
<hr/>
<p>Waking up in a hospital bed was not a new experience for Lucy. What was new were the faces of the people surrounding her. It took her a moment to recognize Aunt Joy and Buffy. She was expecting to see her mom, Quinn and Rose in some combination depending on who didn’t have treatments at the time. She had to close her eyes again when she remembered that all three of them were dead. When she opened her eyes she flinched at the look on Aunt Joy’s face. It was a cross between worried, angry and disappointed that promised not good things.</p>
<p>“What happened?” Lucy croaked.</p>
<p>“You fainted,” Buffy said. “Hit your head.”</p>
<p>That explained the pounding headache. It was half hitting her head and half her mind-reading being turned on for however long she’d been unconscious.</p>
<p>“I’m going to go find the doctor.” Aunt Joy stood up and walked out of the room.</p>
<p>Lucy looked at Buffy. “And why is your mom mad at me?”</p>
<p>Buffy bit her lip. “The doctor said that you had cancer, you know, before. She was pretty wigged. And, well, you didn’t tell her, so major wig.”</p>
<p>“Oh.” Lucy became very interested in staring at the bed sheets and remembering the name for the little tubes going into her nostrils that were giving her extra oxygen. Rose had to use them all the time after her lung function had gotten really bad. Not catheters...Cannula? That was it, nasal cannula.</p>
<p>“Yeah,” Buffy said. “Good luck.”</p>
<p>“Thanks.”</p>
<p>Aunt Joy came back with a short woman whose black hair was pulled back in a sensible, no-nonsense bun. The doctor introduced herself as Dr. Wakim and immediately started shining a light in Lucy’s eyes.</p>
<p>“It looks like you might have a concussion,” Dr. Wakim said. “I’ve ordered blood tests to check for anemia because you’re so pale, but I’m also worried about leukemia.”</p>
<p>Buffy sat up ramrod straight. “Leukemia? Isn’t that a type of cancer? Why are you worried about that? I thought Lucy was cured.”</p>
<p>“They don’t like saying ‘cured’ when they talk about cancer,” Lucy said. “I’m supposed to be in remission.”</p>
<p>Dr. Wakim pursed her lips. “It’s a bit more complicated than that, but Lucy is technically correct. I’m worried about leukemia because some of the treatments she had have been linked to it. Lucy, have you been feeling abnormally tired recently?”</p>
<p>Lucy shook her head. “Nothing that can’t be explained by some late nights. I’m in a band.”</p>
<p>“What about unexplained bruising?” Dr. Wakim asked.</p>
<p>Lucy remembered not to rub her wrists just in time. “Not that I’ve seen.”</p>
<p>“Uh huh.” Dr. Wakim wrote something down on the clipboard she’d taken from the end of Lucy’s bed.</p>
<p>“I’m not lying!” Lucy said. Well, not about anything important to figuring out if she had cancer again or not. She hoped that no one had noticed the still-healing cuts Drusilla had left on her shoulders. Those would not be fun to explain away.</p>
<p>“I don’t think you are,” Dr. Wakim said. “I’d like you to stay until we get the results of your blood tests. We’ll decide after that if you need to stay longer.”</p>
<p>Well, Devon was going to have kittens if he finished his new song and didn’t have a full band to play it with.</p>
<p>“How soon will you know if...if Lucy has leukemia?” Aunt Joy asked.</p>
<p>Dr. Wakim placed a hand on Aunt Joy’s arm. “The blood tests will take until Monday at the latest. If there’s any cause to suspect leukemia I’ll order a bone marrow test. Results on that would take about a week.”</p>
<p>“How much will that cost?” Lucy asked. She shrank back when her aunt narrowed her eyes at her.</p>
<p>“Don’t worry about that,” Aunt Joy said. She turned back to Dr. Wakim. “Is there anything I need to sign?”</p>
<p>“Not right now,” Dr. Wakim said. “Do you have any other questions?”</p>
<p>Lucy double-checked that she could have visitors and then Dr. Wakim left. As soon as she was gone, Aunt Joy practically collapsed into the chair she had vacated earlier. “Lucy, why wouldn’t you tell us?”</p>
<p>“I didn’t want to worry you,” Lucy mumbled. She also wanted to forget about it, but that was looking more and more impossible.</p>
<p>Aunt Joy covered Lucy’s hands with her own. “Honey, we’re your family. It’s our job to worry about you.”</p>
<p>Lucy gave her a small smile. “I know.”</p>
<p>“And she’d find something to worry about anyway,” Buffy said. Lucy laughed. That was true.</p>
<p>Aunt Joy left to get Lucy some of her homework and a few books so that she wouldn’t be bored out of her mind when visiting hours were over. She got back as Lucy was finishing her dinner and being icked at by Buffy for actually liking hospital jello.</p>
<p>“You just hate hospitals,” Lucy said.</p>
<p>Buffy grimaced. “For a good reason.”</p>
<p>Aunt Joy patted the bag she was carrying. “Homework and reading material delivery.”</p>
<p>“You’re a lifesaver, Aunt Joy.” Lucy yawned. “Absolute angel.” Hang on, were angels real? Lucy made a mental note to look that up later.</p>
<p>“You should sleep if you’re tired,” Aunt Joy said.</p>
<p>“I’m not tired.” Lucy yawned again.</p>
<p>Buffy rolled her eyes. “Sure you’re not.”</p>
<p>Aunt Joy put the bag down on her chair. “Visiting hours will be over soon anyway. You get some sleep, young lady.”</p>
<p>“Yes, ma’am,” Lucy said.</p>
<p>Lucy was asleep in a second. After Dr. Wakim had concluded that she didn’t have a concussion and stopped having her woken up every hour, she slept straight through the night and well into Sunday afternoon without any nightmares. She woke up when Buffy, Willow and Xander arrived and they worked on homework and calculations on the Charmed Ones prophecy together until a few hours before sunset. Willow and Xander went to drop off the calculations with Mr. Giles and Buffy went to make an appearance at home before patrolling in case Aunt Joy was back from dealing with yet another emergency at the gallery (Lucy was beginning to think that the only emergency was the lack of competent employees). Lucy had finished most of her homework by then and decided to read so that she’d still be awake on the off chance that the results of her blood tests got back before midnight.</p>
<p>She was well into the third tablet of the Kelper demon <em>Epic of the Thousand Worlds</em> when there was a knock on her door. She looked up and saw familiar peroxide blond hair through the window. “The door’s unlocked.”</p>
<p>Spike opened the door. Lucy made note of him easily stepping into the hospital room and promised herself that she’d sleep with a sharpened pencil under her pillow tonight.</p>
<p>“How you feeling, luv?” he asked.</p>
<p>“Like I’ve had vampires drinking my blood every week for the last month.” Lucy closed her book and crossed her arms. “I’m sure you have no idea why.”</p>
<p>“Careful with the sarcasm, you might cut someone with it.” Spike sat down in one of the chairs next to the bed. “What you reading?”</p>
<p>Lucy answered that question with her own. “Why are you here, Spike?”</p>
<p>Spike scowled. “Dalton’s trying to get that manuscript Julia brought translated. Said I was distracting him. I had to leg it out of there before I did something stupid.”</p>
<p>“Look at you, admitting that you can be stupid.” Lucy sighed and rolled her eyes towards the ceiling. “And I meant why are you here, in this room, in the hospital?”</p>
<p>“Dru said you were here.” Lucy looked at Spike and he shrugged. “In between the talk about the stars. She said I should visit.”</p>
<p>Of course she did. And of course Spike listened. It was Drusilla.</p>
<p>“So, what you reading?” Spike asked. Lucy told him. Spike groaned. “Boring.”</p>
<p>“Kelpers can travel through time, space and alternate worlds,” Lucy said. “That’s not boring.”</p>
<p>“They’re bloody pacifists,” Spike complained. “I reckon there isn’t one good battle in that whole book.”</p>
<p>Lucy opened the book and turned it to face him. “Tablet one, space battle.”</p>
<p>Spike raised his eyebrows. “You’re kidding.”</p>
<p>“Nope. It’s right there, spaceships and all,” Lucy said.</p>
<p>“Well then,” Spike said. “Prove me wrong, why don’t you.”</p>
<p>“And I feel great about it.” Lucy smirked. “Maybe I’ll finally be able to convince you that Green Day is better than the Sex Pistols.”</p>
<p>Spike gave a wicked grin that made Lucy’s stomach flip flop. “Not a chance.”</p>
<p>They debated until Spike ceded to Lucy’s argument. “But only because you’re sick, mind,” he said. “I’m going easy on you for this one.”</p>
<p>“Or you could admit that I’m right.” Lucy smiled. “Come on, three words.”</p>
<p>Spike counted off on his fingers. “Not. A. Chance.”</p>
<p>Lucy stuck out her tongue at him and Spike laughed.</p>
<p>“Evil,” Lucy said.</p>
<p>Spike pointed at his chest. “Bad guy.”</p>
<p>Lucy sighed. She shouldn’t have needed that reminder, but she did. She decided to change the topic to something less directly sobering.</p>
<p>“Spike, can vampires actually smell if someone is sick?” she asked. “I read some stuff that said that, but sources on vampires aren’t totally consistent, or correct.” Case in point, all current sources on Drusilla said she was dust. </p>
<p>Spike frowned. “Well, most of us can at least enough for us to avoid eating someone whose blood will make us sick. It varies. I can track someone by scent and tell you how long they have before whatever they’ve got kills them, and then there’s some who can’t tell the difference between human and cow blood. Why’re you asking?”</p>
<p>“Well...” Lucy looked down at the book in her lap. “The blood tests are taking a long time.”</p>
<p>Spike was silent for a while. Lucy was trying to decide if she should risk looking up or reading his mind when he reached out and took her hand. “What’re they looking for, kitten?”</p>
<p>Lucy curled her fingers around his hand. “Anything that’s off. Red blood cell counts, platelet levels, white blood cell counts. That’s probably why it’s taking so long.” Not that more than a day was long, especially in a hospital the size of Sunnydale General, but it felt like it was when there was nothing much else to do but wait for the results to come back.</p>
<p>“And you’re impatient enough to ask me for help?” There was enough amusement in his tone that Lucy had the brief urge to glare at him.</p>
<p>“I think I’d like to have some warning if I might be dying,” she said.</p>
<p>That sobered Spike up. He gripped Lucy’s hand tightly enough that she flinched. “You’re not going to die.”</p>
<p>“Please don’t break my hand,” Lucy muttered. Spike quickly loosened his grip and Lucy flexed her stiff fingers. “I’m not going to die. I’m going to fight and beat this—if I am sick. It’s the not knowing that’s killing me.”</p>
<p>Spike sighed. “Something with the blood like you’re talking about, that might not actually smell like an illness. Anything else you can give me?”</p>
<p>Lucy shook her head. “Bone marrow, I guess. My doctor was thinking leukemia, so blood and bone marrow.” And that was assuming that the cancer she’d had before hadn’t spread. If it had then there could be a tumour anywhere in her body.</p>
<p>Spike’s grip tightened again, but not so much that Lucy was worried about him breaking her hand by accident. He didn’t say anything, just lifted her hand and brought the back of it up to his nose. Lucy looked up and watched as he breathed in slowly.</p>
<p>After a moment, Spike shook his head. “Smells like you usually do, kitten. If there’s anything else it’s too faint to make out.”</p>
<p>In other words, results were inconclusive.</p>
<p>Lucy smiled at him. “Thanks for trying. Guess I have to be patient.”</p>
<p>“Right,” Spike said. “Patient. When you could be dying.”</p>
<p>“Humans are always dying; it’s part of being alive. At least, that’s what Quinn used to say.” He would probably have gotten along well with Oz, now that she thought about it. They both verged on philosophical on a regular basis, though it had been more out loud with Quinn.</p>
<p>Spike raised an eyebrow. “Quinn? What unfortunate person had their parents name them that?”</p>
<p>Lucy blinked rapidly. A tear ran down her cheek despite that. “Old boyfriend. Dead now.”</p>
<p>Spike was very still. Then, ever so slowly, he got up and sat next to Lucy on the bed with his feet still touching the floor. He put his free arm around her shoulders. Lucy leaned into his embrace, resting her head on his shoulder. They sat like that in comfortable silence until a nurse came by and said that visiting hours were over. Spike’s hand lingered on her arm as he stood, leaving behind a warm feeling that had nothing to do with body temperature.</p>
<p>Lucy ended up sleeping through the next morning instead of getting any sleep that night. When she woke up around two in the afternoon the results of her blood test still weren’t in and her legs were all pins-and-needles feeling because she’d fallen asleep with the <em>Epic of the Thousand Worlds</em> open on top of them. She grimaced. Well, at least she’d gotten enough sleep, sort of. She was still tired.</p>
<p>Sam, Soul and Oz stopped by after school was over, Sam carrying a probably very expanded upon apology from Devon that he couldn’t be there because he was in the zone with working on his new song. The guys stayed for an hour. Soul filled them in on all the gossip from school with Oz nodding every few sentences to confirm that what he said was true. Lucy muttered under her breath and Sam nearly got kicked out of the hospital for shouting when they found out that Jim’s friend had gotten his suspension reversed. He’d apparently made the swim team and had to be at school for “logistical” reasons, according to Snyder.</p>
<p>A few minutes after the guys left, Dr. Wakim knocked on the half opened door and came into Lucy’s room. Lucy sat straight up and put her book to the side.</p>
<p>“I’ve got your results,” Dr. Wakim said before Lucy could ask. “Your red blood cell and platelet counts are low. I’d like for you to have a blood transfusion.”</p>
<p>Lucy grimaced. “Shouldn’t they be replacing themselves by now?”</p>
<p>Dr. Wakim shook her head. “Your white blood cell counts are abnormally high. We’ve got to do a bone marrow biopsy as soon as we can and I don’t want you going into that with these red blood cell and platelet counts.”</p>
<p>“Oh,” Lucy said. “Let me call my aunt.”</p>
<p>The blood transfusion took four hours. All the talk about possible allergic reactions made Lucy’s skin itch, but everything with that went fine. Then she had to change out of her comfy pajamas and into a hospital gown before getting needles stabbed into her hip that pulled and tugged uncomfortably despite the local anaesthetic. She was very careful not to look away from the wall that was next to the table she was lying down on and concentrated on keeping away from the part of the doctor’s and nurses’ minds that focused on what they were seeing. She was sure that if she saw the bone marrow that was coming out with the needle first- or second-hand she would vomit, but she wasn’t going to have people sticking needles in her without eavesdropping on why they were doing it. If anyone tried to experiment on her again then what was left of Black Canary would have something to say about it.</p>
<p>Twenty minutes later she had a sterile bandage on her hip and was checking out of the hospital. She had to keep the wound dry for forty-eight hours and results would be back in a week (Dr. Wakim said, with rather frightening determination that made Lucy kind of sorry for the lab techs). And that should have been it, except Lucy developed a fever that put her back in the hospital right in time for blood delivery night.</p>
<hr/>
<p>Lucy tossed and turned in her hospital bed. The ibuprofen the nurse had put in her IV was bringing her fever down by about half a degree every two hours. She was boiling and every time she threw the blankets off someone pulled them back over her before she could cool down. Even worse, the minimum amount of concentration required to keep her mental walls up was not possible. Everything in everyone’s head in the entire hospital was clamouring to be heard and she couldn’t do anything to protect herself. She tried to latch onto the one person in the room with her but her mind couldn’t even manage that consistently.   </p>
<p>She kicked the blankets off this time and might have heard a sigh before they were put back on. It might also have been a growl. The mental voices of all the people she was hearing were spilling over and making it hard to tell what sounds were coming from outside her head.</p>
<p>Her right wrist cooled suddenly. There was something around it that held her arm in place but cut though her fever so quickly that she didn’t care. It was only a small patch of skin that was no longer burning up, but it was enough for her to pull herself together and draw her mind back into the confines of the room, at least for a little while. There weren’t as many voices there.</p>
<p>“...here, Peaches?” a man was saying, probably out loud, unless it wasn’t.</p>
<p>“Buffy mentioned she was here,” a different man said. ...<em>blonde short strong I think I love her I think I love her...</em>“...check on her.”</p>
<p><em>...bloody sire can’t mind his own can’t fight here not important sick dying should have known... </em>“You’ve checked. Now leave.” The first man growled. It was definitely a growl.</p>
<p><em>...won’t work don’t know but have to tell him Buffy would... </em>“...hand?”</p>
<p>“She keeps trying to pull her IV out. It’s the easiest way to stop her.” <em>...shouldn’t be surprised interfering won’t listen...</em></p>
<p>“You’re thinking about siring her.” <em>...blood pain blood dirt red blood blood blood...</em></p>
<p><em>...stupid jumping to conclusions being right won’t listen won’t won’t... </em>“...if I am? It’s none of your bloody business.”</p>
<p>“You and I both know what happens when a person loses their soul.” <em>...blood pain torture hate killed my sister killed Kathy I killed my sister I killed my sister Ikilledmysister...</em></p>
<p>
  <em>...hurt them killed them got what they deserved blood pain torture hate Cecily Dru Cecily Dru Drusilla Lucy CecilyDrusillaLucy Drusilla red everything red...</em>
</p>
<p>“...and Buffy will kill you.”</p>
<p>“Didn’t know you cared.” <em>...freedom blood pain blood dust tears...</em></p>
<p>“I don’t,” <em>of course I care responsible for them PennDrusillaSpikeSam </em>“but Drusilla does. And so does Lucy, now.” <em>...mine ours family like family...</em></p>
<p><em>...won’t be the same beauty murder innocent beauty killer soul demon nothing gold can stay... </em>“Damn you.”</p>
<p>“Darla already did.” <em>...beauty blood death...</em> “Take care of her, Spike. Don’t make me a liar.”</p>
<p><em>...hate when he’s right stupid bloody should show him a liar nothing gold can stay nothing gold can stay nothinggoldcanstay...</em> “I’ll try. Maybe.”</p>
<p>A sigh (probably a sigh). <em>...wouldn’t won’t would he shouldn’t can’t...</em> “Don’t make me stake you.”</p>
<p><em>...nothinggoldcanstaynothinggoldcanstaynothinggoldcanstay...</em> “...goodbye.”</p>
<p>The room was suddenly quiet save for the steady hum of <em>nothinggoldcanstay</em>. Lucy opened her eyes (she didn’t know she had closed them). The lights in the ceiling made them water. She blinked and the lights went out. The room was dark and cool. Lucy had the strangest feeling that she was floating, somewhere underwater in a drowned world.</p>
<p>She wasn’t burning anymore. Her fever had gone down, or perhaps she was dreaming that it had. She had to be dreaming or else she was seeing a ghost.</p>
<p>Quinn was standing at the end of her bed. He had the same big brown eyes and carefully cropped black curls as when he was alive, but his face was full and round, not made up of the hollows of skin stretched over a skull. His arms and leg were lean muscle and his skin was tanned rather than pale. He was standing steadily on one leg of flesh and blood, one of metal and plastic. He wasn’t dressed in the suit they’d buried him in, but rather basketball shorts and a well-worn Superman t-shirt.</p>
<p>Quinn—dream or phantom, phantom even if this <em>was </em>a dream—smiled at her. “Sick again, huh?”</p>
<p>Lucy swallowed. “Yeah,” she whispered. Her throat was so dry and sore.</p>
<p>“I like him.” Quinn nodded, indicating someone to Lucy’s right. “He’s been here all day.”</p>
<p>Lucy reluctantly dragged her eyes away from her dead boyfriend and looked to see who he was talking about. In a chair next to the bed, Spike was curled up, fast asleep and looking more innocent than Lucy had ever seen him. She turned back to Quinn, only mildly surprised that he hadn’t disappeared in the split second she’d been looking away.</p>
<p>“I know he’s a vampire,” Quinn said before she could force any words out of her poor abused throat. “I still like him. He’s here for you.”</p>
<p>Lucy raised her eyebrows. Yes, Spike was being ridiculously nice lately, but he was still a murderer who wanted to kill her and Buffy.</p>
<p>Quinn shrugged. “Sure, he’s bad company. But he’s good bad company.” He grinned. “Kind of reminds me of me.”</p>
<p>Lucy laughed despite her throat protesting and covered her mouth with one hand. She looked quickly at Spike, who stirred but didn’t wake up.</p>
<p>Quinn’s smile took on a wistful quality. “I love hearing you laugh. It’s not the same when I’m not all here, you know?” He sighed. “Keep your head up, Luce. You’re gonna get through this.” He disappeared in a flash of white light.</p>
<p>Lucy looked at the spot where Quinn had been standing, a strange warmth growing in her chest. Then she reached out and took Spike’s hand, closing the short distance between them. Spike’s fingers tightened around her’s. She gave a small smile, put her head back on the pillow and fell into a deep sleep.</p>
<hr/>
<p>Dr. Wakim was reluctant to let Lucy leave the hospital. Spike kept reminding Lucy that she had been delirious for almost two days (and talking almost constantly, which explained her sore throat). But by Friday night Lucy was back home, though on strict bedrest. Very strict bedrest. Aunt Joy had threatened to tie her to the bed if she got up for anything other than going to the bathroom.</p>
<p>Lucy was reading when Buffy came back from her patrol. She looked up when Buffy climbed through the window and winced when she saw the streaks of blood on her cousin’s arm. “Rough night?”</p>
<p>“Uh huh.” Buffy threw the handful of stakes and small knives she was carrying under her bed. “Not sure what it was, but it had a lot of claws and a lot of heads.”</p>
<p>Lucy put her book down. “Where’s the first aid kit?”</p>
<p>Buffy dug through one of her drawers up to the elbow of her uninjured arm and eventually pulled out a white plastic box. “Here.”</p>
<p>“Let me take care of it.” Lucy moved over so that Buffy could sit next to her. She started cleaning the blood off of Buffy’s torn up shoulder but stopped when she noticed something else that was wrong. “Buffy, why do you have a tattoo?”</p>
<p>Buffy groaned. “It’s a long story.”</p>
<p>Lucy resumed cleaning Buffy’s wounds. “We have time.”</p>
<p>When the explanation involved demonic possession, Lucy was entirely unsurprised.</p>
  </div><div class="fff_chapter_notes fff_foot_notes"><b>Notes for the Chapter:</b><blockquote class="userstuff">
          <p>Anyone who gets all the references in this chapter deserves a round of applause.</p>
        </blockquote></div></div>
<a name="section0014"><h2>14. What's My Line (Part 1)</h2></a>
<div class="story"><div class="userstuff module">
    
    <p>
  <strong>
    <em>Giles</em>
  </strong>
</p>
<p>Recovering from the Eyghon situation was a progress that Giles thought he would never fully accomplish. It didn’t help that Jenny still wasn’t really talking to him and Buffy, Willow and Xander were all giving him concerned looks when they thought he wasn’t watching. When Lucy came into the library on Monday morning he was sure that she was going to ask about it since Buffy must have told her at some point. Instead she put a pile of books on the counter and asked if he had anything else about Sumer and was the prophecy that Willow had translated about Charmed Ones or a Charmed One?</p>
<p>“Charmed Ones,” Giles said. “You’re not asking about...”</p>
<p>Lucy frowned. “Asking about what? Was there another prophecy that no one told me about?”</p>
<p>“Uh, no. Sumer, you say? What did you want to learn about?” He turned and headed towards the stacks, Lucy following him.</p>
<p>“Well, there was this <em>nin</em>, I think she’s a priestess but there was also something about a king, <em>lugal</em>, right? And that confused me so I was hoping for a history book, or maybe a dictionary.”</p>
<p>Giles looked at Lucy and raised his eyebrows. “When on earth did you start learning Sumerian?”</p>
<p>Lucy shrugged and looked down at her feet. “Here and there. All the interesting stuff is in dead languages, you start picking them up.”</p>
<p> “Fair enough.” Giles turned back to the bookshelves. “I think I have a Sumerian-Latin dictionary somewhere.”</p>
<p>Giles quickly found a Sumerian lineage record and a Sumerian-English dictionary that he did not remember owning. Lucy accepted them from him with a smile. “Thanks, Mr. Giles.”</p>
<p>“You’re quite welcome” Giles said. “It’s good to see you back, at school and so forth.”</p>
<p>“Good to be back, Mr. Giles. See you later.” Lucy spun around and ran out of the library seconds before the bell warning students to get to class started to ring. Giles shook his head and went back to work. There was a demon Buffy had fought on Friday that he had to research.</p>
<p>The quiet of the library was broken at the end of the school day by the usual suspects. Buffy, Willow and Xander came in talking about something to do with shrubs.</p>
<p>“I mean, Lucy didn’t choose shrubs,” Buffy said. “What does that mean for us? Are we doomed to be one with the shrub?”</p>
<p>Giles sighed and looked up from the book he was scanning through while waiting for the infernal computer to determine if he’d loaned out another book that he couldn’t find. “I’m almost afraid to ask what you’re talking about.”</p>
<p>“Career day personality quizzes, G-man,” Xander said. “They’re going to tell us what job we’re going to have when we’re old and grey and probably still in Sunnydale.”</p>
<p>“Don’t call me that.” Giles frowned. “And there were shrubs involved?”</p>
<p>“One of the quiz questions.” Xander grinned and went to sit down at the table.</p>
<p>Buffy was still worrying. “What if it says I have to be a mortician or a gravedigger? I already spend too much time with dead people; any more will totally kill my social life.”</p>
<p>“What happened to ‘I’m going to be the Slayer until I die so it doesn’t matter anyway’?” Willow asked.</p>
<p>Buffy shrugged. “I’m being optimistic.”</p>
<p>“Sure, optimistic.” Willow nodded. “That didn’t sound optimistic.”</p>
<p>“So, Giles, any vampire festivals happening this week that we should know about?” Xander asked.</p>
<p>“Not that I’m aware of.” Giles looked briefly at the computer screen, which hadn’t changed in the slightest. “Don’t you have homework?”</p>
<p>“What’re you working on, Giles?” Willow asked, coming behind the checkout counter to look at the computer screen.</p>
<p>Giles sighed. “I am attempting to use the system you created to check if one of my books is missing. Unfortunately, it does not seem to be working.”</p>
<p>“Wow, you must be desperate.” Willow blushed. “I mean, did you click ‘search’?”</p>
<p>Giles ignored her first comment and squinted at the computer. “Did I what?”</p>
<p>Willow hit a key and the computer screen changed, showing a list of book titles. “Oh, I’ve got this one. It’s in my locker. Do you want me to get it?”</p>
<p>“That would be helpful, Willow. Thank you.” Giles looked back at the book he was holding and hoped that he wasn’t blushing.</p>
<p>Once Willow came back with the book he needed, Giles was able to determine that the reptilian demon Buffy had faced was a Ruun-dra and it could be killed by cutting off its middle head. Buffy muttered something about how she couldn’t be sure which head was the middle one, but she agreed to take a sword with her on patrol that night. The children headed home soon after that and Giles went back to his current big project, which was figuring out what was in the du Lac manuscript that Spike’s minion had stolen. After a few hours of searching that only helped him rule out anything from Ancient Egypt, Giles locked up the library and headed home himself. He would make a good cup of tea before looking in some of the books he had at home. Hopefully he would find an answer soon.</p>
<p>He still didn’t have an answer the next morning, when Buffy reported that one of Spike’s minions had stolen something from a mausoleum and that Angel had delivered a warning of danger and doom.</p>
<p>“Whatever was stolen, I don’t know about it,” Lucy said. “I haven’t seen Spike since...it’s been a few days. And even if I did know I wouldn’t tell you.”</p>
<p>“Say what?” Xander asked. “I heard you wrong, right?”</p>
<p>Lucy shook her head. “Drusilla...She gets angry and...” She shivered and rubbed her arms. “Unless the world is ending I’m not risking that again.”</p>
<p>Buffy patted Lucy comfortingly on the shoulder and glared at Xander, who shut his mouth with an audible snap.</p>
<p>Buffy described what she remembered of the mausoleum and Xander volunteered to go with her after school to get a closer look at it. Willow and Lucy promised to help Giles with research. As they walked out of the library, Giles took off his glasses and began to carefully clean them with a handkerchief.</p>
<p>This was a problem.</p>
<hr/>
<p>The first thing Giles heard after the lunch bell rang was Lucy asking, “Mr. Giles, when you look at me do you see a future police officer?”</p>
<p>“Do I see...I beg your pardon?” Giles looked up from the book he was reading and blinked in confusion.</p>
<p>Willow and Lucy walked to the table where Giles was sitting and put their bags down. Willow immediately dove into the piles of books Giles had on the table, picking out the ones that he indicated to her.</p>
<p>“A future police officer,” Lucy repeated. “The magic of personality tests has decided that I should go into law enforcement. That or become a librarian, but librarian actually makes sense.”</p>
<p>“Does it really?” Giles asked. “Did you choose shrubs?”</p>
<p>Lucy looked up from the book she had opened, looked down at it pointedly, and looked back at Giles. “And also my dad was a teacher.”</p>
<p>Giles cleared his throat. “Well, I rather had you pegged for a Watcher.”</p>
<p>Willow’s head shot up and both of the girls stared at him with wide eyes. Lucy made a sound similar to a squeaky wheel.</p>
<p>“Both of you,” Giles added. “And Xander.”</p>
<p>“Giles, make with the ‘splainy.” Willow’s voice was several pitches higher than normal.</p>
<p>“You are quite good with languages,” Giles said. “Your translations especially, Willow, have been very technically correct. And all three of you have already picked up the standard fighting techniques taught to Watchers over several years at the academy.”</p>
<p>“But that’s all Sunnydale survival stuff.” Willow looked at Lucy. “Isn’t it?” Lucy nodded silently and Willow turned back to Giles. “See? It’s need to know, not future Watchers in training.”</p>
<p>“‘Need to know’?” Giles blinked. “Willow, your skills are beyond ‘need to know’, even on an active Hellmouth. You can translate eight languages between the three of you and have killed more vampires than most Watchers do in their entire career!”</p>
<p>Willow opened and closed her mouth wordlessly. “But...but...”</p>
<p>“All the interesting stuff is in dead languages,” Lucy mumbled.</p>
<p>With that, by some mutual agreement, they all went back to their books. Giles resolved to bring up the career Watcher suggestion at a later date.</p>
<p>The girls left when lunch was over to go to the afternoon career fair. Giles continued looking through books until he finally, <em>finally </em>found something that was useful. In a book of healing magic that he had no idea why he thought would be of help there was a reference to a reference to a reference that led him to a description of the contents of the stolen du Lac manuscript. He’d quickly translated it from Latin, double-checked his translation twice even though he’d been reading Latin since he was five, and then stared at the book he’d found the description in for several minutes before going back into the piles of books to try to find a possible counter-measure. He didn’t look up from his research even when Willow and Lucy came back.</p>
<p>“I found a description of the manuscript Spike stole,” Giles said as soon as Buffy walked into the library with Xander. “It contains a ritual to restore a weakened vampire back to full health.”</p>
<p>Willow and Lucy looked at him, aghast. “Why are we looking for cheese demons then?” Willow demanded.</p>
<p>“Cheese demons?” Lucy asked. “I’ve got limericks by some seer called Eric the Undying.”</p>
<p>“Yes, well.” Giles quickly tried to turn the focus back to the du Lac manuscript. “The manuscript can only be read with the use of a key. We have to stop Spike from getting the key and failing that—”</p>
<p>Buffy interrupted him. “Is this key shaped like a cross? Because that mausoleum said ‘du Lac’ and there was a cross missing.”</p>
<p>“Oh dear,” Giles said.</p>
<p>The key was shaped like a cross. Spike almost definitely had the key.</p>
<p>“So, Plan B?” Xander gestured for Giles to continue.</p>
<p>Giles massaged his temples with one hand. “And failing that we have to stop the ritual.”</p>
<p>“Point me at whatever I need to kill,” Buffy said.</p>
<p>Giles gestured at the books on the table. “I have been working on that. The ritual must take place on unholy ground. There’s an abandon church on the edge of town that fits that description due to the mass human sacrifice that took place there in—”</p>
<p>“Giles!” Buffy interrupted again. “Short version, please.”</p>
<p>“Ah, yes.” Giles adjusted his glasses. “We have a location, but we need a time and date.”</p>
<p>Xander leaned back in his chair. “I’ll take ‘At the Time This Week that Causes the Most Interruption’ for one-hundred dollars, Alex.”</p>
<p>Lucy let out a yelp that made everyone turn to her. She had her eyes closed and was rubbing her temples.</p>
<p>“What is it?” Giles asked.</p>
<p>“Drusilla is happy.” Lucy opened her eyes and stared blankly at the book in front of her. “Drusilla is very happy.”</p>
<p>After a minute or two of silence, Xander managed to sum up what they were probably all thinking, though Giles would never admit it out loud for fear of reducing morale. “We’re dead.”</p>
<p>“Nonsense,” Giles said. “There’s a fairly simple way to prevent the ritual from happening.”</p>
<p>All eyes were on Giles.</p>
<p>“You couldn’t have told us that first?” Buffy complained.</p>
<p>“I was getting to it.” Giles opened the book the manuscript’s description was in to make absolutely sure that he was relaying the right information. “The presence of the weakened vampire’s sire is required for the ritual’s success.”</p>
<p>“Angel,” Buffy said.</p>
<p>Giles nodded. “Indeed. We will need Angel to stay away from Drusilla.”</p>
<p>“Well, they’re not exactly hanging out.” Xander shrugged. “So, no problem, right?”</p>
<p>Willow shook her head. “We should still give Angel a call and Buffy can drop by his place before sunset to make sure he’s, you know, safe.”</p>
<p>“Angel’s a big boy, Wills. He can stop himself from getting kidnapped.” Xander looked at Buffy. “Right?”</p>
<p>“Can’t hurt to check.” Buffy frowned. “Could you call him, Lucy? I can’t remember his phone number. Actually, I didn’t even know he had a phone.”</p>
<p>Lucy nodded slowly and got up to make the call. After a few minutes she let them know that she’d passed on the warning and Angel promised to be careful.</p>
<p>“Is there anything else we can do?” Willow asked.</p>
<p>Giles opened another book. “Well, dark rituals tend to take place during the full moon or the new moon.”</p>
<p>“Look up moon phases for this month, got it.” Willow moved behind the computer and started tapping away at the keyboard.</p>
<p>Giles turned to Lucy, who was looking at him expectantly. “Lucy and I will see if we can find more details on the ritual itself.”</p>
<p>Lucy nodded and began selecting books to search through.</p>
<p>“Buffy, you should get some training in before going to check on Angel.” Giles frowned, tapping his chin with a pencil. “And Xander...” There was a job for him, really, but there were only so many books that would be useful for this research.</p>
<p>Xander jumped out of his chair. “I will go get the necessary sugar fix, pick up more books from Willow’s locker, and help you and Lucy when I get back.”</p>
<p>Giles pointed at him with the pencil. “Yes. Very good idea.”</p>
<p>Everyone scattered to do the jobs that had been assigned to them. Xander came back to the library with books and doughnuts after half an hour, by which time Willow had found out that there had been a full moon four days ago and the new moon wasn’t until the end of the month. Two hours after that the children called their parents with excuses for why they wouldn’t be home until late that night and Buffy headed out to meet Angel and patrol. Several hours later the four researchers were starting to get annoyed.</p>
<p>“There’s nothing here,” Xander said, pushing yet another book to the side. “Can’t we go and burn that church down? Can’t be a ritual if there’s no place to do it.”</p>
<p>“There’s other unholy ground in Sunnydale, isn’t there Giles?” Willow asked.</p>
<p>Giles didn’t look up from the Etruscan he was puzzling out. “There are a few other places, but the church would be best for this particular ritual.”</p>
<p>Xander clapped his hands together. “I’ll get the gas cans.”</p>
<p>“If we destroy the church then we’ll have no idea where the ritual will be,” Lucy said.</p>
<p>There was an angry sigh and the sound of a book being slammed shut. Giles lifted his head to chastise the culprit and got distracted by the sight of the clock. “Good lord. Is that really the time?”</p>
<p>The other three looked up from their work and frowned at the clock.</p>
<p>“Looks like,” Xander said after a moment. “Unless it’s broken.”</p>
<p>The clock was a minute or two away from striking one in the morning.</p>
<p>“The three of you ought to have gone home ages ago,” Giles said. The situation wasn’t so urgent as to require an all-night research session what with the new moon being weeks away. “You have school tomorrow. Later today.”</p>
<p>Xander tried to wave off Giles’s concerns. “Eh, it’s career fair part two, nothing important.”</p>
<p>Giles wasn’t having it. “The three of you will go home this instant and get adequate sleep to make it through the day without falling asleep in class.”</p>
<p>Xander held up his hands in surrender. “Okay, G-man. Wills, can I crash at your place?”</p>
<p>Willow nodded. “Sure. My parents aren’t home. Lucy, do you want to sleep over too? That way you won’t have to walk home by yourself.”</p>
<p>Lucy shrugged. “Sure, thanks. I told my aunt I was at your house anyway, may as well make it not a total lie.”</p>
<p>“I will be here if you need anything,” Giles said as the children packed up their things.</p>
<p>“You should try to sleep too, Giles.” Willow hoisted her backpack over her shoulders. “You won’t—I mean, none of us will be any use if we’re all tired and making mistakes.”</p>
<p>Giles took his glasses off and rubbed his eyes. “Yes, Willow, but I can take a nap in my office while none of you will be able to fall asleep without getting in trouble with your teachers.”</p>
<p>Xander clapped Willow on the shoulder. “The G-man is right, Willow. Let’s go before he changes his mind.”</p>
<p>“Goodnight, Mr. Giles,” Lucy said over her shoulder as they left the library.</p>
<p>“Goodnight,” Giles muttered. He did wish Xander would cease calling him by that infuriating nickname.</p>
<p>Giles was woken up by something being slammed down on the table right next to his head. He sat bolt upright, glasses askew, a pencil held above his head in his fist ready to be brought down upon his attacker.</p>
<p>Buffy took her hand off of the table and crossed her arms. “Morning, Giles.”</p>
<p>Giles settled his glasses back into their proper position. “Ah, yes, good morning, Buffy. And, ah, who might this young lady be?”</p>
<p>The brown-eyed, dark-haired girl standing at attention slightly behind Buffy seemed to stand up even straighter as she met Giles’s gaze. She gave a curt nod in greeting but didn’t say anything. Giles looked back to Buffy for an explanation.             </p>
<p> “This is Kendra,” Buffy said. “Kendra the vampire Slayer.”</p>
  </div></div>
<a name="section0015"><h2>15. What's My Line (Part 2)</h2></a>
<div class="story"><div class="fff_chapter_notes fff_head_notes"><b>Notes for the Chapter:</b><blockquote class="userstuff"><p>This chapter contains gun violence, including a gun being fired by a person dressed as a police officer into a group of students at school, as in the episode.</p></blockquote></div><div class="userstuff module">
    
    <p>
  <strong>
    <em>Lucy</em>
  </strong>
</p><p>“There are two Slayers?” Xander looked at Willow and Lucy. “Are you guys hearing the same thing as me?”</p><p>“I’m hearing it.” Willow nodded like a bobble-head in slow motion. “I’m not believing it.”</p><p>Lucy had to agree with Willow. She was sure that someone would have mentioned it if it was possible for there to be more than one Slayer at a time.</p><p>Mr. Giles had his glasses in one hand and was polishing them with the second handkerchief he had pulled out of his pocket when the first one had turned out to have a hole worn straight through it.  “As absurd as it may seem, Kendra is a Slayer. I have spoken to her Watcher. She was Called in June, right around the time that Buffy faced the Master.”</p><p>“Oh!” Willow turned to Buffy, who was lounging against the checkout counter. “When you drowned, before Xander gave you CPR, you must have died for a little bit and then you came back to life but you had died so the next Slayer was Called even though you were alive again because you had died and the next Slayer becomes the Slayer after the Slayer before them dies.”</p><p>“Breathe, Wills,” Xander said.</p><p>“Why do all these people know about your Calling?” Kendra asked Buffy. The other (?!) Slayer had a crisp Jamaican accent and looked like she might be of African descent, but she reminded Lucy of the Chinese Slayer she’d seen in Spike’s memories. Xin Rong and Kendra had something in common other than being Slayers, but Lucy wasn’t sure what. The way they moved, maybe?</p><p>Buffy tilted her head. “Because they’re my friends.”</p><p>Kendra frowned. “But your identity should be secret. Strangers knowing that you are the Slayer puts your mission at risk.”</p><p>“They aren’t strangers, they’re my <em>friends</em>. Lucy is my <em>cousin</em>.” Buffy pushed herself away from the counter. “Don’t you have friends?”</p><p>“Friends,” Kendra drew out the word like she was sounding out a different language, “are a distraction. All that matters is our Calling.”</p><p>Well, she was certainly cheery.</p><p>“We can be very distracting,” Xander said. “But we help the Buffster with the slaying. Mostly the researching, but also the slaying.”</p><p>Willow nodded. “Yeah, we’re really good at research. We can translate eight languages and I’m working on this database to make it easier to find resources.”</p><p>Kendra didn’t look impressed. “Only eight?”</p><p>Mr. Giles cleared his throat. “We do have some other issues to be dealing with. Kendra’s Watcher sent her here because he has found signs pointing to the rising of a very dark power.”</p><p>“Drusilla,” Lucy said. Everyone turned to look at her and she shrank behind the pile of books on the table in front of her. “Unless there’s another demon in town who’s about to get their strength back and likes torture and killing children.”</p><p>“This is Drusilla of the Whirlwind, yes?” Kendra asked. “I have read of them.”</p><p>“There also appear to be assassins after Buffy,” Mr. Giles said. “She was attacked last night a few hours before she and Kendra met.”</p><p>Xander dropped the pencil he had started twirling between his fingers. “You couldn’t have led with that?”</p><p>Mr. Giles put his glasses back on and picked up a ring that had been sitting on the checkout counter since Lucy, Willow and Xander had arrived. “I have only just begun researching them, but this appears to be their symbol and if what I’ve found is correct the one that Buffy killed is the first of three.”</p><p>Mr. Giles passed the ring around. Lucy turned it this way and that to look at it from all angles. It was gold and black with a device that looked a bit like a fire.</p><p>Xander accepted the ring from Willow and held it close to his eyes. “Two questions. One, do these guys have a name, and two, how do we kill them?”</p><p>“They are the Order of Taraka.” Mr. Giles searched the table and picked up one of the books. “It says here that they are invisible, simply another face in the crowd that can kill you before you realize they’re there. They are always sent in threes but every assassin works alone. They do not stop until the kill has been completed or the bounty made unavailable.”</p><p>Xander slowly put the ring down. “So, I hear Hawai’i is nice this time of year.”</p><p>“I am inclined to agree with you,” Mr. Giles said.</p><p>Buffy crossed her arms. “Okay, first Angel, and now you. Why does everyone think I should be running for the hills? I’m the Slayer...I’m a Slayer.”</p><p>The book Mr. Giles was holding snapped shut. “Perhaps because the Order of Taraka is made up of tireless assassins of both the demon and human varieties, some of whom have had centuries to hone their craft.”</p><p>“Oh look!” Willow pointed at the clock. “We’re going to be late to the career fair and since you guys have career presentations to go to that I am not at all bitter about and Snyder is on Buffy’s case and I have a friend to meet, we shouldn’t be late. Let’s let Giles and Kendra get a jump start on the research and meet back here at lunch, okay? Great!”</p><p>Xander rubbed his hands together. “Oh boy, I can’t wait to learn about being a prison guard.”</p><p>Buffy rolled her eyes and smirked at Lucy and Willow. “We all know you’re absolutely thrilled, Xander.”</p><p>Kendra gave them an odd look as they hurried out of the library. Lucy heard Mr. Giles’s frustrated sigh before the doors closed behind them.</p>
<hr/><p>The career fair had taken over the cafeteria, auditorium and all the hallways in between. The booths for law enforcement and correctional services were both in the cafeteria, so they didn’t have to split up which made Lucy feel a little bit better. If all of them were within shouting distance then they had a better chance of fighting off any assassins that might attack Buffy. There probably wouldn’t be any attacks in the middle of the school though. There would be too many witnesses...right?</p><p>Wrong.</p><p>Lucy wasn’t sure when the police officer had started firing her gun into the crowd of students, but she dove for cover with everyone else, knocking a boy she thought was named Jonathan to the floor in the process. Her ears were ringing and she had a pounding headache from all the raw panic in the room. She didn’t even realize she had been shot until Jonathan (she was sure that was his name after he introduced himself half a dozen times) started worrying over her after the assassin got away by holding a knife to the throat of a blonde girl who wasn’t Buffy.</p><p>“Oh my god, you’re hit. Someone come help her! What’s your name? I’m Jonathan. Oh my god. You’re bleeding. I feel faint.” Jonathan sat down hard on the floor underneath a lunch table.</p><p>Lucy muttered a few words that shouldn’t be said in polite company if that polite company was made up of Britzai demons.</p><p>One positive thing that could be said for the emergency services in Sunnydale was that they had a good response time. It took the paramedics less than five minutes to get to the school and Lucy soon had the bullet wound in her shoulder cleaned up, closed and bandaged. She was barely scratched, at least compared to some kids who were being taken out of the building on stretchers.</p><p>Lucy looked for her friends after the paramedic let her go. She spotted Willow’s red hair across the room and headed towards her. When she saw who Willow was talking to she stopped right in the path of another student, took one step sideways to avoid a collision and stared for a moment before continuing on.</p><p>“Careful, Oz, you might use up your word quota for the week.”  Lucy nodded towards where Oz was covering part of his arm with his other hand. “You got hit too?”</p><p> Oz nodded.</p><p>“The paramedic is coming back soon, he got hurt protecting me, and why didn’t you tell me you and Lucy knew each other?” Willow changed who she was talking to mid-sentence. She turned back to Lucy. “Why didn’t you tell me you knew Oz? We talked about this last night and you never said that you know Oz.”</p><p>“You didn’t name names and I was half asleep when we were talking last night,” Lucy said. “Are you hurt?”</p><p>Willow shook her head. “Oz kept me safe and he got hurt, see?”</p><p>Lucy was saved from having to remind Willow that they’d both already mentioned Oz’s injury by Buffy pulling up a patch of tile and asking how they were. Buffy and Willow talked for a bit while Oz’s wound was stitched up and his arm put in a sling. Lucy and Oz listened, Oz adding a word or two of input to the conversation. Lucy didn’t say anything (which if Buffy and Willow had known Oz better would have raised a red flag) but debated so furiously with herself in her head that she started frowning without realizing it.</p><p>“Has anyone seen Xander?” Willow asked.</p><p>“He wasn’t on one of the stretchers,” Lucy said.</p><p>Buffy stood up. “He might have gone to the library. I’ll go check.”</p><p>Lucy came to a decision. “I’m going to the factory.”</p><p>Buffy and Willow looked at her with alarm. “What! Why?” Willow squeaked.</p><p>Lucy looked down at the floor. “We need information. I can get it.”</p><p>“But, but, Drusilla!” Willow gestured at Lucy with both hands. “Drusilla and badness and only in case of world-endage!”</p><p>“And this isn’t bad enough to qualify?” Lucy indicated everything going on around them. “If Drusilla gets back to one-hundred percent we’re going to be seeing Sunnydale-endage pretty soon.”</p><p>Buffy opened her mouth to say something, but Lucy cut her off. “Don’t try to change my mind or I’ll lose my nerve.”</p><p>Buffy pouted. “Well, maybe you should. This isn’t a good idea.”</p><p>“I know.” Lucy gave her friends a nervous smile. “If anyone asks, I got scared and went home.”</p><p>Oz put a hand on her uninjured shoulder. “Don’t die.”</p><p>Lucy squeezed his fingers. “Wasn’t planning on it.”</p>
<hr/><p>The walk to the factory from school was long enough that Lucy had time to begin thinking seriously about turning back. No one would blame her for not carrying through with her hare-brained idea. They would probably be glad. She took in a deep breath and let it out slowly. She was going to do this because only she could. Angel going anywhere near Spike and Drusilla right now was a bad idea and anyone else would be killed in minutes (aside from Buffy, but Buffy would go in with intent to kill, not for reconnaissance).</p><p>Inside, the factory was a hive of activity, which was a surprise considering that sunset was still hours away. It did mean that Lucy didn’t have to search for Spike though. He was in the middle of the factory floor directing proceedings.</p><p>Lucy walked right up to Spike, sidestepping busy minions on the way. “I’m mad at you.”   </p><p>Spike looked at her and frowned. “Why do you smell like you’re bleeding?”</p><p>“That’s why I’m mad at you. One of your assassins decided to spray and pray in the middle of my school. It was a great tactic. The only person who didn’t get hurt was Buffy.” Lucy crossed her arms and winched at the tugging of her stitches.</p><p>“Well, that’s unfortunate,” Spike said. “You’re alright though?”</p><p>“I’m cutting school to yell at a vampire. ‘Alright’ may be a stretch.” At least she’d confirmed that Spike had hired the Order of Taraka. Well, he hadn’t denied it anyway.</p><p>One of the minions came up to Spike and said something in a low voice that Lucy’s human ears couldn’t hear. Spike slapped the minion on the back of his head and the other vampire cowered.</p><p>“Mid<em>night</em>, not mid<em>day</em>, idiot!” Spike growled. “Honestly, doesn’t anyone have a brain?”</p><p>The rest of the minions froze. Over by the stairs, Dalton hesitantly raised his hand.</p><p>Spike rolled his eyes. “You lot get back to work!”</p><p>“Is Drusilla having a party?” Lucy asked as the minions went back to swarming about the factory for whatever jobs they were doing. She was willing to bet that they were preparing for the ritual.</p><p>Spike waved her off. “Something like. Don’t worry about it. Your test results back yet?”</p><p>“No.” Lucy fixed him with a glare. “And don’t tell me not to worry about it. If you guys are doing something that’s likely to end the world I’d like to have some warning.”</p><p>“Wait, are we ending the world?” a nearby minion asked. “I like the world. It has beer.”</p><p>“We aren’t ending the bloody world, not tonight anyway,” Spike grumbled.</p><p>The minion frowned. “I don’t want to end the world.”</p><p>Spike squeezed his eyes shut. “We. Are. Not. Ending. The. World. Now do your job before I stake you!”</p><p>The minion ran off, the objects in the box he was carrying clanking together worryingly. Lucy hoped that they weren’t anything magical or otherwise explosive.</p><p>“Why is it so hard to get good help?” Spike raked his fingers through his hair and looked around the factory, probably checking to see if anyone else was screwing things up.</p><p>It might have had something to do with the one thing all the books actually seemed to get right: People got stupid when they were turned into minions. Only Dalton seemed to have escaped that fate, which meant he probably wasn’t a minion but a properly sired vampire (what some of Mr. Giles’s books called a fledgling and others called moroi) who didn’t have the power or the desire to strike out on his own.</p><p>Instead of rattling off an answer that Spike already knew, Lucy shrugged and immediately regretted it. How had she managed to forget that she’d been shot an hour ago?</p><p>A woman dressed as a police officer had fired a gun into a room full of students. A gun. At school.</p><p>“You’re shaking.” Spike led her to the table and pulled out a chair for her to sit down.</p><p>Lucy covered her face with her hands, peaking through her fingers so she wasn’t totally sightless. “I’m so stupid.”</p><p>She could go toe-to-toe with a vampire but a gun scared her. Go figure.</p><p>“No, you’re not,” Spike said.</p><p>He patted her back and she spun around and slapped his hand away. “You sent her! Why? Tired of Buffy beating you so you went straight to overkill? The Order of Taraka! <em>Why?</em>”</p><p>“Your Watcher’s good at his job.” Spike ignored the murderous look Lucy was directing at him. He took a pack of cigarettes out of his jacket and lit one, blowing a stream of smoke away from Lucy. “Look, I need the Slayer out of the way for a bit. And if they manage to kill her, well, that’s what I’m paying them for.”</p><p>Lucy clenched her fists. “And if they kill everyone but her? There are kids in surgery right now, if they didn’t die on the way to the hospital, because your assassin didn’t care about bystanders!”</p><p>Spike took another drag. “There are always more kids.”</p><p>Tears welled up in Lucy’s eyes. She didn’t know if they were sad tears or angry tears. Why was she wasting her time like this? Spike didn’t have a soul. He didn’t care what happened to anyone except himself and Drusilla.</p><p>Lucy wanted to storm out, but she hadn’t gotten enough information yet. It sounded like the ritual would be happening tonight at midnight, but she didn’t know for sure and she didn’t know how Spike was planning to get Angel where he and Drusilla needed him. She wiped the tears away.</p><p>“It is a waste though, dying like that,” Spike said. “Well, can’t be helped.”</p><p>Before Lucy could say anything, a cooing sound made both her and Spike turn around.</p><p>Drusilla swayed slightly on her feet. “Naughty Spike didn’t tell us our kitten was here. He lost her invitation.”</p><p>Spike went over to Drusilla and steadied her. “You shouldn’t be up here, pet. You need to save your strength.”</p><p>“I want our kitten to see the present you got me.” Drusilla smiled. “She’ll like it.”</p><p>Spike kissed Drusilla on the forehead. “I don’t think she will, Dru.”</p><p>“But the stars said so.” Drusilla pouted. “Pretty please.”</p><p>Lucy was inclined to agree with Spike, but she didn’t have much of a choice as Drusilla took her hand and she had to follow or be dragged. Even as weak as she was, the vampire was still stronger than Lucy. Spike just shook his head and opened the door for them.</p><p>Lucy bit back a stream of swear words when she reached the place on the stairs where she could see most of the bedroom below. Angel was tied to the posts at the foot of the bed. His bare chest was covered with red burns that had come from holy water based on how they were shaped. Lucy stared at him while Drusilla babbled about diamonds and fire. Then she stared at Spike with a look that she hoped conveyed that Buffy was going to kill him. Spike shrugged.</p><p>Drusilla walked over to Angel and dragged her fingernails up his torso, leaving bleeding lines behind. “Did you think about what you did, Daddy?”</p><p>Angel struggled to lift his head to look at her. “Dru...”</p><p>“Ah ah!” Drusilla picked up a little silver pitcher and held it above Angel’s chest. “Make the pretty colours for the kitty.”</p><p>Smoke rose from Angel’s skin where the holy water Drusilla poured on him made contact. He let out a strangled scream. Lucy whimpered.</p><p>“They screamed,” Drusilla said. “They begged. And you killed them.”</p><p>Spike put a hand on Lucy’s arm and tilted his head towards the door. Lucy looked at Angel and Drusilla once more before following Spike up the stairs. She waited until they were back out on the factory floor before turning to Spike with a pained look on her face that she didn’t have to fake.</p><p>“Why do you have Angel downstairs?” She left the “getting tortured by Drusilla” unsaid.</p><p>Spike took his cigarette out of his mouth. “Well, Dru wanted to have a family reunion, see?”</p><p>Lucy’s entire body shook with anger, fear, or some mixture of both. “Don’t lie to me. I can read your mind, remember?”</p><p>Spike smirked. “Then why don’t you?”</p><p>Lucy didn’t dignify that question with a response. Spike knew exactly why she wasn’t reading his mind. The reason was in the basement torturing Buffy’s boyfriend.</p><p>“It’s none of your business, kitten.” With one finger under her chin, Spike tilted Lucy’s face towards his. “Now, you run along home and stay there, alright? We’ll see you when it’s all over.”</p><p>Lucy wanted to ask when <em>what </em>was over, but she knew better than that. Spike was in love, not stupid. Instead she said “Tonight. I...Let me see you tonight? Please?”</p><p>Spike frowned slightly. Lucy gave him a pleading look, not full-blown puppy eyes but enough to make his expression soften. Her continued shivering probably helped too.</p><p>“Well, you did say please. Can’t make any promises though.” He kissed her forehead. “Now run home, before Dru decides she wants you to play with her and Peaches.”</p><p>Lucy did run all the way home and as a result didn’t have the breath to question it when Xander yelled at her to get in the car while spraying Cordelia with the garden hose. She dove into the back seat of the red car in front of the house and Cordelia sped away before all of the doors were closed. Lucy fumbled for the seat belt with one hand and grabbed the seat with the other, trying not to be thrown around the car when Cordelia peeled around turns. Cordelia and Xander were yelling at each other and that put enough pressure on Lucy’s mind that it was easier for her to open the floodgates and sort through their thoughts to figure out what was going on.</p><p>What was going on turned out to be a bug assassin, made of bugs, not giant bug. He was some coordinated mound of larvae that had attacked Xander and Cordelia when they went to go look for Buffy at home. That was all three assassins accounted for, so at least they had some good news when they burst into the library and started talking over each other.</p><p>Also, Xander and Cordelia had kissed, but that wasn’t important right now.</p><p>“One at a time,” Mr. Giles ordered.</p><p>“The ritual’s happening tonight,” Lucy blurted before Xander or Cordelia could get ahead of her. “Midnight. They have Angel.”</p><p>“Oh dear lord,” Mr. Giles said.</p><p>“But, but, the moon isn’t right!” Willow exclaimed.</p><p>Willow, Oz and Soul were sitting around the research table. Soul raised his hand. “Uh, what ritual?”</p><p>Willow gave him and Oz a quick explanation that they somehow hadn’t gotten to in the hours they must have been in the library while Xander and Cordelia told Mr. Giles about the bug assassin. Lucy took one of the empty chairs and tried to catch her breath. All the running, babbling and mind-reading had left her feeling dizzy and overheated.</p><p>Mr. Giles handed out jobs once Xander and Cordelia had finished their report. Xander and Cordelia would research the remaining assassins and how to fight them, and he and Willow would try to find more specifics on the ritual. Then Mr. Giles turned to Lucy, Oz and Soul. He hesitated.</p><p>“Lucy, I suppose you could help Willow and I, if you’re feeling up to it. And you boys could...uh...well.” Mr. Giles took off his glasses and frowned. “Well.”</p><p>“Where are Buffy and Kendra?” Lucy asked.</p><p>Mr. Giles put his glasses back on. “They called us a few minutes ago. They’ve gone to see what information they can get out of Willy.”</p><p>Lucy frowned. “The demon bar guy?”</p><p>“Yes.” Mr. Giles nodded. “When they call back I’ll tell them to meet us at the church after sunset.”</p><p>Lucy nodded and then let out a groan as her head spun and the floor felt like it was rocking beneath her. She put her head down on the table. “Can I...sit this one out?”</p><p>“She got shot, Giles,” Willow said helpfully. “See? There’s still blood on her arm.” Lucy could practically hear Willow’s eyes widen as the other girl realized what she had just said. “You went to factory full of vampires with blood on you? Are you crazy?”</p><p>“No,” Lucy muttered. “Stupid.”</p><p>“Okay, you’re stupid.” Lucy turned her head enough for Willow to see her glaring at her. Willow squeaked. “Not stupid, not stupid! Reckless! Not stupid!”</p><p>“Oz and I could crash with Lucy at Oz’s place,” Soul suggested. “Spike and Drusilla haven’t been invited in there and we can get Devon and Sam to stay there too. Safety in numbers, right?”</p><p>It wasn’t a bad idea and it would probably be a lot safer than dragging two injured people into a fight. The trouble would come if Aunt Joy found out that Lucy had spent the night unsupervised with four teenage boys, but she was out of town on business and if Sunnydale wasn’t destroyed then Lucy would have plenty of time to get home before she got back. Mr. Giles agreed. Oz exchanged phone numbers with him and then he and Soul helped Lucy get to Oz’s van without her legs giving way.</p><p>Lucy fell into the back seat of the van. Her head was doing loop-de-loops. “Probably shouldn’t have run.”</p><p>“Yeah,” Soul said. “Are you sure we shouldn’t take you to the hospital?”</p><p>Lucy started to shake her head but quickly stopped when it felt like her brain was going to bounce out of her skull. “Vampires don’t need an invite for hospital rooms. I’ll be fine after a nap.”</p><p>A quick nap on Oz’s couch turned into six hours of uninterrupted sleep where the only dreams Lucy had were about playing guitar by a river, probably thanks to Oz’s calm mind (if Oz could bottle that he’d make a fortune and create world peace to boot). When Lucy woke up she felt significantly better and very hungry. She wolfed down three of the sandwiches Oz had made and drank two mugs of hot chocolate. Once her stomach wasn’t growling at her for missing lunch there wasn’t anything else to do but wait. Devon and Sam had arrived sometime during Lucy’s nap and Devon tried to talk about their music but even he didn’t feel like debating key changes when the fate of Sunnydale was hanging in the balance.</p><p>The clock ticked closer and closer to midnight. Oz turned the TV onto a local news channel and they watched the anchor talk about UC Sunnydale’s football team for half an hour. It was a slow news day, which either meant that the bodies hadn’t been found yet or the usual deadly demons were lying low. Lucy was pretty sure it was both. With the Order of Taraka in town the number of demons who weren’t nervous could probably be counted on one hand.</p><p>Sam got up and started to pace around the living room at around eleven. “I hate this. I really hate this.”</p><p>“We all do.” Devon looked at Lucy, Oz and Soul. “Right?”</p><p>“We all hate this,” Lucy confirmed. But what else could they do? The boys didn’t have the training and Oz and Lucy were too injured to be useful in a fight.</p><p>Lucy picked up and put down a book several dozen more times without opening it. The news anchor had moved on to talking about a robbery. Devon soon joined Sam in pacing the room. Soul looked like he would have liked to do the same but there wasn’t any space left for him to walk in.</p><p>A minute after midnight by the clock above the fireplace, Lucy gasped. Her heart was beating frantically for no physical reason, but it wasn’t a panic attack either. There was intense pleasure and pain being projected directly into her mind. Drusilla. The ritual had started.</p><p>“What’s wrong?” Devon asked.</p><p>Lucy didn’t reply out loud. She wasn’t sure she could open her mouth without moans or screams coming out. She reached for the paper that Devon had been halfheartedly writing song ideas on and scribbled three words, “It’s happening now.”</p><p>Lucy stayed curled up into a ball on the couch until the feelings from Drusilla stopped, or at least became weak enough that she could ignore them.</p><p>“What was that?” Sam asked once Lucy was facing the room again.</p><p>Lucy rubbed her forehead. “You know that thing that happens to Mina in <em>Dracula </em>after Dracula makes her drink his blood? Book, not movies.”</p><p>Soul and Oz did, Sam and Devon didn’t. Soul explained the basics of Mina’s psychic link with Dracula and Oz nodded once to show his agreement.</p><p>“So this vampire chick gave you her blood and now you can see and hear what she’s seeing and hearing?” Devon asked.</p><p>“Her name is Drusilla. And it’s more feelings and thoughts than surroundings.” Lucy frowned. Maybe that was because Drusilla was a seer? Or it could be because <em>Dracula </em>wasn’t a totally accurate depiction of vampires. Very accurate, but not totally.</p><p>Sam grinned nervously. “Well, the ritual’s happened and Sunnydale hasn’t fallen into a sinkhole. That’s good, right?”</p><p>“With Drusilla we’re worried about massacres, not unnatural disasters,” Lucy said. “But no sinkhole is still good.”</p><p>There were grim looks all around. Sam sat down while Devon resumed his pacing. They were all less tense than they had been when they didn’t know what was going on, but only slightly. Lucy carefully paid attention to the corner of her mind where Drusilla had a foothold and provided updates on the situation from the vampire’s warped point of view. Fear, excitement, lust, anger and elation all came and went over the next half hour. At one point Lucy thought she could smell smoke, but the scent disappeared too quickly for her to be sure.</p><p>The doorbell rang and everyone jumped about five feet into the air. Devon looked at Oz. “Your parents?”</p><p>Oz shook his head. “Massachusetts.” That of course meant that his parents were in Massachusetts visiting his sister at MIT and were unlikely to be ringing their own doorbell at one in the morning.</p><p>Soul opened the curtains a crack and peeked out the window. “It’s Buffy!”</p><p>Devon opened the door and Buffy came barraging in without an invitation. She immediately hugged Lucy so tightly that Lucy squeaked.</p><p>“We’re alive and the bad guys are dead,” Buffy said with a tired smile. “It’s over.”</p><p>Lucy hugged Buffy back and decided that she’d tell her that Drusilla at least was still alive after they’d gotten some sleep. She pointedly ignored the lump in her throat.</p>
<hr/><p>Aunt Joy got back home before sunset the next day. Buffy and Lucy had tried to cook dinner so that she could rest after her trip, but when she walked into the house the smoke alarm was going off and Buffy was trying to chisel a horribly burnt grilled cheese sandwich out of the frying pan. The girls looked at her with dismay. Aunt Joy laughed and told them to open the windows while she ordered pizza.</p><p>“So, aside from almost burning the house down, what did you two get up too while I was gone?” Aunt Joy took a bite of her pizza slice and looked around the dining room with exaggerated motions. “There doesn’t seem to have been a wild, Mom-free party.”</p><p>Buffy shrugged. “Oh, you know, career week stuff. I’m supposed to be a police officer.”</p><p>“Or a landscaper,” Lucy added.</p><p>Buffy tore her pizza crust in half. “I should not have chosen shrubs.”</p><p>Lucy laughed into her glass of water. “At least the landscaper that came to school didn’t try to kill you.”</p><p>Buffy and Aunt Joy both looked at Lucy with wide eyes. Buffy had gone pale.</p><p>“What was that?” Aunt Joy asked.</p><p>Lucy tried desperately to walk back what she had said, maybe pass it off as a joke or Aunt Joy mishearing her, but what came out of her mouth was “The police officer at the career fair was actually an assassin trying to kill Buffy. Oz and I got shot. One girl died. But at least there weren’t any vampires. Vampire attacks at school get old fast. Don’t they, Slayer?”</p><p>Aunt Joy was as pale as a vampire. Buffy’s expression was rapidly going from stunned and panicked to angry and afraid.</p><p>Only Lucy could hear Drusilla laughing.</p>
  </div></div>
<a name="section0016"><h2>16. The More Things Change</h2></a>
<div class="story"><div class="fff_chapter_notes fff_head_notes"><b>Notes for the Chapter:</b><blockquote class="userstuff"><p>Warning: This chapter contains mentions of vomit.</p></blockquote></div><div class="userstuff module">
    
    <p>
  <strong>
    <em>Lucy</em>
  </strong>
</p>
<p>Buffy had been avoiding Lucy for the past five days. To be fair, Lucy was avoiding Buffy too. And Willow. And Xander. And Mr. Giles. If Drusilla could do more than control her voice—if she could rifle through her mind, see through her eyes or puppet the rest of her body—then it was too dangerous for Lucy to be around the only people fighting her. Heck, she was even avoiding Cordelia, and as far as she knew Cordelia and Xander only made contact to insult each other and make out in closets.</p>
<p>Aunt Joy seemed to be taking the revelation that vampires were real and her daughter slayed them relatively well. Mr. Giles had been called in to give her the full explanation and she hadn’t fainted or suppressed it. She hadn’t accepted it either though. She hadn’t tried to send Buffy back to a mental hospital (and boy had Lucy been mad when she learned about <em>that</em>) but she had used the “Have you tried not being [blank]?” line that Lucy had heard far too often from her so-called friends after they found out that she liked kissing girls as well as boys. At least there wasn’t a derogatory term for Slayer that could be inserted into the blank space at the end of that sentence, not that Aunt Joy would have used one if there was. She didn’t subscribe to the kick-our-daughter-out-of-the-house-because-she’s-dating-a-Black-boy bigotry of her parents.</p>
<p>There was still tension between Lucy, Buffy and Aunt Joy as they sat waiting in a small examination room at Sunnydale General. The hospital had called two days before to say that Lucy’s results were in and Dr. Wakim had reserved the earliest time she had free to go over them. Lucy would have gone on her own and had even asked Oz to give her a ride, but Aunt Joy insisted that she couldn’t be alone and the whole family would be with her since the time was after school on Monday. Buffy hadn’t even said anything about hating hospitals, though that was probably because she was still giving Lucy the cold shoulder.</p>
<p>Lucy shifted in her seat. She could sense (though she didn’t know how) that Drusilla was still asleep but that didn’t stop her from worrying that she would end up under her control during this appointment and say something she shouldn’t again. Buffy and Aunt Joy both knew about that little problem, but that wouldn’t stop Drusilla if she wanted to let Dr. Wakim know that Buffy was a Slayer. She could probably make Lucy speak faster than Buffy could cover her mouth.</p>
<p>The door finally opened and Dr. Wakim came in with a file folder filled nearly to bursting tucked under one arm. Lucy sat up straight. On either side of her, Buffy and Aunt Joy did the same.</p>
<p>Dr. Wakim greeted them. “Now, I’m sure Lucy would like me to get straight to the point.” She opened the folder and referenced something inside. “The lab found abnormal myeloid stem cells in your sample. Based on that, and a few other things that I can explain for you later, I am diagnosing you with acute myeloid leukemia.” She paused, probably to give them time to process and jump in with any questions.</p>
<p>Lucy nodded slowly. She was prepared for this. At least, she thought she was prepared. Mostly she felt numb. And dizzy. Dizzy was also a feeling she was feeling.</p>
<p>“Wha—Wha—” Aunt Joy took a shaky breath and managed to get out a full sentence. “What are her treatment options?”</p>
<p>“Chemotherapy, starting as soon as possible,” Dr. Wakim said.  </p>
<p>Buffy interrupted her. “Wait, isn’t chemotherapy the reason she has leukemia? And you want to give her more?” The “Are you crazy?” that Buffy left out was made obvious by her tone.</p>
<p>“Chemotherapy has been linked to leukemia, but that doesn’t necessarily mean it causes it,” Dr. Wakim said patiently. “In this case, chemotherapy is the treatment that is most likely to be successful.”</p>
<p>“How long am I going to have to stay in hospital for?” Lucy asked.</p>
<p>Dr. Wakim took a pen out of the pocket of her white lab coat and wrote on something inside Lucy’s file. “At least a week. We’ll have to see which drugs you respond to and adjust accordingly.”</p>
<p>And not add anything mad scientist-worthy to the mixture. The people at Sunnydale General did seem to have some sense of ethics.</p>
<p>“What if it doesn’t work?” Buffy demanded.</p>
<p>Dr. Wakim didn’t even raise her voice. “Then we try again.”</p>
<p>Buffy crossed her arms. “Not a very exact science, is it?”</p>
<p>“Buffy!” Aunt Joy exclaimed.</p>
<p>Buffy deflated a little as her mom scolded her. She muttered an apology to Dr. Wakim, who acknowledged it without flinching and then turned back to Lucy. “It would be best for you to start chemotherapy this week.”</p>
<p>Lucy nodded. “Devon is going to kill me. We’re supposed to play the Bronze on Saturday.”</p>
<p>There was an awkward silence.</p>
<p>“I know the band’s not important right now,” Lucy said. “Let me have something small to worry about.”</p>
<p>Oz was sitting on the front steps when they got home. He stood up as Lucy walked towards him. “How was it?”</p>
<p>Lucy sighed. “I’m going to be in the hospital all week. I’ll miss the gig.”</p>
<p>Oz nodded. “We’ll visit.”</p>
<p>Aunt Joy asked Oz if he would stay for dinner. He was silent for a moment before he shook his head. “I think I’d be in the way. Thanks though.”</p>
<p>Oz gave Buffy a nod of acknowledgement and walked away. Buffy and Aunt Joy stared after him and he disappeared down the road.</p>
<p>“What did that mean?” Buffy asked.</p>
<p>Lucy’s gaze seemed to be repelled from her aunt and cousin. She looked down at her shoes. “I think he thinks that we need to talk.”</p>
<p>They made it halfway through dinner without saying a word. Buffy didn’t even look up from her food. Then Aunt Joy put down her utensils and cleared her throat. Lucy and Buffy looked at her.</p>
<p>“What are the two of you not telling me?” Aunt Joy asked.</p>
<p>A lot. Lucy could think of a lot of things they weren’t telling her, and that was only on her end. She decided to go for the more obvious, less earth-shattering options. “William isn’t a college student. He’s...He was a vampire. And he went by Spike. And Drusilla isn’t his sister. She was his sire.”</p>
<p>Aunt Joy’s eyes were wide. “He...but...He stayed at the hospital with you.”</p>
<p>Lucy nodded but didn’t say anything. Trying to explain Spike would take more than a ten minute dinner table conversation and Buffy still had to make her confession.</p>
<p>As if she was the one who could read minds, Buffy spoke after a few seconds of silence. “Angel is a vampire too, but he has a soul so he’s not all killy.”</p>
<p>“Oh,” Aunt Joy said. “That’s...good?”</p>
<p>“Totally of the good,” Buffy said. “He’s been helping with the slaying.”</p>
<p>Aunt Joy made a sound that might have been understanding. “So both of you are dating vampires?”</p>
<p>Lucy flinched and looked down at her plate. “Spike’s dead. Dust.” And he was dating Drusilla, but Aunt Joy didn’t have to know that.</p>
<p>Aunt Joy gasped. “Oh honey, I’m so sorry.” She got up from her seat and enveloped Lucy in a warm hug that Lucy couldn’t help but lean into. “What happened?”</p>
<p>Lucy looked at Buffy over Aunt Joy’s arm. “Ritual gone wrong. Drusilla survived. Spike didn’t.”</p>
<p>Buffy gave a small nod and focused her attention on her cutlery, her lips pressed into a thin line. She wouldn’t be contradicting Lucy’s version of events. Good to know that they were still really good at the whole lying thing.</p>
<p>Lucy rested her head on her aunt’s shoulder. “I should start packing.”</p>
<p>“Finish eating first,” Aunt Joy said. She patted Lucy’s back before taking a seat.</p>
<p>The conversation was kept away from vampires and Slayers for the rest of the meal. Buffy tried to talk Aunt Joy into going to see Dingoes Ate My Baby perform after Lucy got out of the hospital. She started off halfheartedly but actually seemed to have herself and her mom convinced that it was a good idea by the time everyone was done eating. Lucy didn’t mention that as far as she knew the next place they would be playing after she was out of hospital was the Shelter. Aunt Joy would definitely have to be eased into the idea of a demon club.</p>
<p>Buffy helped her mom with the dishes while Lucy packed for the hospital. She came up to their room while Lucy was frowning at her cassette player trying to decide if it would be overkill to bring it with her.</p>
<p>“Have you only packed books?” Buffy asked.      </p>
<p>Lucy looked up at her and raised her eyebrows. “You’re talking to me now?”</p>
<p>Buffy shrugged. “It feels mean to be mad at you when you’re sick. So this is me, not mad.” She went over to their closet and pulled out a pink sundress, one of the few pieces of clothing they could share without it being too short on Lucy or too long on Buffy.</p>
<p>Lucy shook her head. “I’m not going to the beach, Buffy.”  </p>
<p>“You need something clean to wear when you get out.” Buffy put the dress on Lucy’s bed and disappeared back into the closet, emerging with Lucy’s blue leather jacket a few seconds later. “Trust me.”</p>
<p>Lucy sighed. “Well, you usually trust me.”</p>
<p>Buffy gave her a small smile. “Now come on, you can’t only bring books.”</p>
<hr/>
<p>There was little ceremony to Lucy’s first dose of chemotherapy drugs. By now she knew the routine so she just blinked rapidly a few times as the IV went in and kept one eye on the needle while she mapped the shortest route to the washroom for when she needed to throw up. The drugs in the IV looked normal, no shimmering colours or odd shadows like a few of the other kids had mentioned seeing in their IVs before Dr. Capson’s experiments kicked in. Everyone dismissed those as illusions or hallucinations, even the kids who’d reported them.</p>
<p>She was sharing a room with a pretty blonde girl named Nixie who went to Kent Preparatory School. After the second time Lucy threw up, Nixie gave Lucy a paper cup filled with a warm drink once she was back in bed.</p>
<p>“It’s ginger tea,” Nixie said. “My dad brought it for me. It always makes me feel better.”</p>
<p>Lucy took a sip of the tea. The warmth almost instantly calmed her stomach. She smiled at her roommate. “Thanks.”</p>
<p>“No problem.” Nixie unfolded her <em>Seventeen </em>magazine. “So, what you in for?”</p>
<p>“Leukemia,” Lucy said. “You?”</p>
<p>“Same.” Nixie gave a closed-lip smile. “A few years?”</p>
<p>“Sort of.” Lucy took another sip of the tea. “It’s kind of a long story.”</p>
<p>Nixie shrugged. “We have time.”</p>
<p>Their conversation eventually wound up on the topic of boyfriends. Nixie shared a story about her last boyfriend leaving her for her sister. She ended it with an annoyed sigh. “You know, sometimes I wish he could feel what it’s like to be trivialized like that. It’s like you’ve been turned into a bug and you’re not even important enough to be stepped on. I swear all boys are like that. They’re totally happy with you until the next pretty girl comes along, and then whose fault is it when they stray?”</p>
<p>Lucy shook her head. “Not all boys.”</p>
<p>Nixie waited for a few seconds. “Well? I’m ready for you restore my faith in the opposite sex.”</p>
<p>“He was...sweet.” Lucy smiled slightly and drew circles on her bedsheet with her finger. “He could always make me laugh even on days when I wanted to die. We were each other’s rocks.”</p>
<p>Nixie drew her knees up to her chin. “What happened?”</p>
<p>Tears pricked at Lucy’s eyes. For once she was able to hold them back, though her nose and throat became perfumed with salt. “He died.”</p>
<p>“I’m sorry,” Nixie said quietly. “Was it...Did it happen recently?”</p>
<p>Lucy shook her head. Then almost immediately she nodded. “It was at the end of September, but it almost feels like it’s been forever.”</p>
<p>“September?” Nixie seemed stunned. “But you—” She shook her head. “I mean, it seems like you’re being affected by something that happened a lot more recently. Maybe something that you wish you could fix? That’s just how it looks to me.”</p>
<p>Lucy looked sideways at the other girl. “There is one thing.”</p>
<p>Nixie leaned towards her. “Yeah?”</p>
<p>“I’d rather not talk about it.” Especially not with someone who seemed a little too excited to hear about what was making her miserable. Being a shoulder to cry on was one thing. This was something else entirely.  </p>
<p>“Oh.” Nixie blushed. “Sorry, I...I can get a little pushy sometimes. I wish there was something I could do to help you feel better.”</p>
<p>Lucy took a slow breath before she replied. The two of them had to coexist for at least a week. It would be best if they didn’t want to strangle each other.</p>
<p>“Unless you can bring someone back to life your options are very limited.” Lucy forced a smile on her face. “Thanks though.”</p>
<p>Nixie nodded and went back to her magazine, which gave Lucy a chance to properly compose herself. Or at least try to compose herself. She was almost okay again when she looked out the window and saw that the sun had nearly set. The thought that maybe Spike would drop by was immediately stifled when she remembered that Spike was dead. She sighed and turned away from the window, rolling onto her side and resting her head on her pillow.</p>
<p>“You’re sure I can’t help?” Nixie looked so sincere and so sympathetic that Lucy struggled not to spill everything that had happened in the last week. “You don’t have to tell me anything. We could do each other’s hair or make wishes on stars or...”</p>
<p>The words were on her lips, but Lucy paused. Nixie was a total stranger. Sure she seemed nice, but this was the Hellmouth. There were lots of things on the Hellmouth that seemed nice but really weren’t. It was impossible to tell which side of the line Nixie was on without her giving up and attacking outright. Unless...</p>
<p>Lucy opened her mental door a crack. Then she did the telepathic equivalent of wide-eyed staring.</p>
<p>That was interesting.</p>
<p>That was <em>very </em>interesting.</p>
<p>Lucy sat up and blinked innocently at Nixie. “What’s a vengeance demon?”</p>
<p>Nixie stared at Lucy. Her mind filled with what Lucy was pretty sure was a lot of very creative swearing in at least three languages. “What?!”</p>
<p>“A vengeance demon,” Lucy repeated. She listened to Nixie’s internal monologue for a second. “Or do you prefer justice demon? Either way I’m not going to be making any wishes. Sunnydale has enough problems.”</p>
<p>“I can’t work in these conditions! Anyanka <em>so </em>owes me for this,” Nixie muttered furiously. “Not her jurisdiction my ass.” She disappeared in a swirl of smoke and light. </p>
<p>Lucy put all her mental defences back into place as she stared at the place where Nixie used to be. She was going to have to explain that by dinner time. Great.</p>
<p>She was distracted from trying to come up with a better excuse than “she was a vengeance demon” by a knock at the door. Buffy poked her head into the room.</p>
<p>“Taking a break from patrol?” Lucy asked.</p>
<p>“Kinda.” Buffy opened the door wider, revealing Angel standing behind her. “Can we come in?”</p>
<p>Lucy nodded. Buffy came to stand by her bed while Angel did his usual lurking shadow thing closer to the door. Lucy studied Angel carefully. Along with acting normally he wasn’t holding himself like he was in pain, which was a marked improvement from the last time she’d seen him. There was a fairly large scar in the middle of his right hand, but that didn’t seem to be causing him any problems. Vampire speed-healing was probably responsible.</p>
<p>“I want Angel to stay with you overnight,” Buffy said.</p>
<p>Lucy didn’t ask why. Spike wasn’t around to protect her from anything that might come into the hospital looking for a snack. Angel could also provide a good distraction for Drusilla if she made an appearance, physically or through Lucy.</p>
<p>“Okay,” Lucy said.</p>
<p>Buffy tilted her head. “I was kind of expecting an argument.”</p>
<p>“I’m tired. Go save the world.”</p>
<p>“Hopefully that won’t be necessary tonight.” Buffy smiled. “Get some rest.”</p>
<p>“Will do,” Lucy promised.</p>
<p>Buffy spoke with Angel too softly for Lucy to hear before she kissed him goodbye and hurried out of the room. Lucy and Angel looked at each other, the words of their last real conversation from after Angel had rescued Lucy from Drusilla hanging heavy in the air between them. One word, really. Angel had said they were family.</p>
<p>“Spike’s too far removed for you to sense him, isn’t he?” Lucy barely got the question out. She already knew that Angel hadn’t cultivated the psychic power necessary to connect with the childe of his childe.</p>
<p>Angel nodded. “I’m sorry.”</p>
<p>“Not your fault.” Lucy eyed the door. “Let’s figure out what we’re going to tell the nurses about you.”</p>
<p>“Don’t worry about the nurses,” Angel said. When Lucy looked at him with confusion he added, “The guys at the blood bank know me. I take expired blood off their hands. It’ll be fine.”</p>
<p>Well, that answered a few questions that Lucy was too polite to ask.</p>
<p>“Okay.” Lucy yawned. “If you're sure.” She yawned again. Strange how she hadn’t actually been tired until she said that she was.</p>
<p>“Of course I’m sure.” Angel sat down in the chair next to her bed. Then he stood up and moved the chair so that he was between her and the door. “Get some sleep. I’ll keep watch.”</p>
<p>Lucy could have said something about how they weren’t in a war zone, but she fell asleep before she could even think the words. Besides, Sunnydale was practically a war zone, so anything she could have said wasn’t really valid. Angel woke her up so that she could eat dinner. She scarfed the food down and went straight back to sleep. She didn’t wake up again until long past sunrise, when Angel was gone and it was almost time for her next dose of chemo. It was possibly the most consecutive hours of sleep she had gotten since passing out on Oz’s couch on the night of the ritual. Her dreams were filled with blood and tears, so it wasn’t the most restful sleep, but you win some, you lose some.</p>
<p>A routine was established over the next six days. Lucy would have breakfast in the morning after she woke up and then throw it up a few hours later after chemo. Then she’d sleep until school was over and the guys or Buffy, Willow and Xander would come to visit. She would take a nap if Aunt Joy didn’t come by and then stay awake while Angel was there. Being mostly nocturnal was going to wreak havoc on her sleeping habits once she was back home, but for now it was working fine.</p>
<p>Angel was a big help with the homework Willow and Oz dropped off, especially history. More than a few times Lucy found herself forgetting to write stuff down while he told stories about historical events that he’d actually experienced, sanitizing the murder and chaos that the Scourge of Europe/Whirlwind left in their wake. Even knowing that most of the time Angelus had only been where he was to kill people, Lucy was fascinated by the firsthand accounts.</p>
<p>Drusilla hijacked Lucy’s body three times during her hospital stay. The first time Lucy had been alone in her room. Drusilla had only made her lips curl into a smile before she let her go, either because the sun was still up or because there was no one else around. The other two times had been when Angel was there. Lucy didn’t want to think about what happened then, it was far too embarrassing but at least she hadn’t drawn any unwanted attention.</p>
<p>“How can she hate you so much and love you at the same time?” Lucy asked after the third hijacking, once she could look Angel in the eyes again without her face overheating. That was a simplified question. Drusilla’s feelings about Angel were much more complicated than hate and love.</p>
<p>Angel sighed. “That’s her way. Drusilla was always devoted, to her family, to her God.”</p>
<p>“And now you’re both of those things,” Lucy said. “Right?”</p>
<p>After thinking for a moment, Angel nodded. Both of them were quiet for a time. In the furthest back recesses of her mind, Lucy could feel Drusilla being quite unhappy about something.</p>
<p>Eventually, Lucy began to speak slowly, weighing each word before it passed her lips. “All of the books I’ve read say that vampires keep nothing from when they were human. The demon takes over completely.”</p>
<p>Angel’s voice was gruff. “The books are wrong. It isn’t replacing a human with a demon, it’s putting a demon where the human’s soul should be.”</p>
<p>That wasn’t a surprise. For some reason, Mr. Giles’s library seemed to be full of conflicting and incorrect sources on vampires. At least it was accurate when it came to other demons and things that could end the world.</p>
<p>Lucy tilted her head. “So the vampire is the same person as the human, but the evil version?”</p>
<p>“Not exactly.” Angel’s expression was pensive. “Becoming a vampire...It takes the best things about you and twists them, and it takes the worst things and amplifies them.”</p>
<p>Lucy mulled that over for a moment. “Liam loved his sister, Angelus killed her. Liam was a failure, Angelus became the best at what he did out of spite. Liam was an artist—”</p>
<p>“Angelus made killing an art,” Angel finished.</p>
<p>“So if it was me, the demon would make me love Buffy so much that I imprisoned her or killed her,” Lucy said. Even only as an example the idea made her shiver.</p>
<p>Angel nodded. “Or sired her and slept with her.”</p>
<p>Lucy’s eyes widened. An expression of pure disgust crossed her face. “I think I’m going to be sick.”</p>
<p>Angel looked as nauseous as she felt. “Yeah, me too.” He frowned. “Wait. How’d you know about Kathy?”</p>
<p>Lucy blinked. “What?” She didn’t know what he was talking about.</p>
<p>“My sister. How did you know...?” He didn’t finish the sentence, which wouldn’t have helped her understand what he was asking about if he hadn’t already mentioned his sister.</p>
<p>Lucy shook her head. “I...I’m not sure. I just know.” He had mentioned having a sister before, hadn’t he? He must have, but that didn’t explain how she knew that Angelus had killed her. She tried to change the subject. “Do you think the demon could be taught to be good? Without a soul, I mean.”</p>
<p>Angel frowned. “I don’t know. Maybe. There are plenty of demons without souls who aren’t inherently evil.” He searched her face, looking for what she wasn’t sure. “Have you—” He cut himself off and shook his head.</p>
<p>“What? Have I what?” Lucy demanded. She knew he wasn’t talking about her vampire training question.</p>
<p>“Nothing,” Angel said. “You should get some sleep. You said you have an early start tomorrow.”</p>
<p> “Yeah.” She was getting discharged in the morning. Lucy shot a weak glare at Angel. “Don’t think this conversation’s over.”</p>
<p>Angel gave her a smile that was meant to be placating. He didn’t know that she had already read his mind and caught the tail end of the information she wanted as the thought flashed across his psyche. She paid the price for her impatience. Angel’s idea turned over repeatedly in her mind, keeping her half-awake for hours. In the morning she felt foolish for having thought about it so much when it was plainly incorrect.</p>
<p>She wasn’t a seer.</p>
<p>...right?</p>
<hr/>
<p>Buffy tried to catch Lucy up on all the demonic happenings of the past week on the drive home. She seemed to have forgotten that Drusilla might be able to learn everything that Lucy knew. Lucy didn’t want to remind her. She liked that Buffy was talking to her so candidly. She liked seeing how relaxed Aunt Joy was around the Slayer talk now. She didn’t want to ruin it, but she had to. Her happiness wasn’t worth giving information away to the enemy.</p>
<p>Her happiness wasn’t worth giving information to the enemy.</p>
<p>She had to tell Buffy she was a mind-reader, didn’t she? Drusilla already knew. She could use that against them. It was a miracle she hadn’t already.</p>
<p>First, she had to remind Buffy about Drusilla’s ability to control her. Buffy went silent when she did. Her lips parted slightly.</p>
<p>“Oh,” Buffy said. “I forgot.”</p>
<p>Aunt Joy jumped into the awkward silence. “The one thing Buffy didn’t mention is that I went on a date.”</p>
<p>That statement provided the distraction that Aunt Joy must have intended.</p>
<p>“You went on a date?” Buffy exclaimed. “Why didn’t you tell me?”</p>
<p>Lucy stared at her aunt. She had gone on a date? When? With who?</p>
<p>Aunt Joy smirked. “I think you were complaining about slime that night.”</p>
<p>Buffy blushed but quickly recovered. “We need details, Mom!”</p>
<p>Aunt Joy chuckled as she pulled the car into the driveway. “In a little while. You have to help Lucy unpack first.”</p>
<p>Buffy groaned as she took Lucy’s bag out of the trunk. “She’s been using me as a pack mule all week,” she complained to Lucy.</p>
<p>Her complaint carried to Aunt Joy, who retaliated with the fact that Buffy was much, much stronger than her. It only made sense for Buffy to do the heavy lifting.</p>
<p>“Yeah, yeah.” Buffy rolled her eyes and started upstairs with Lucy’s bag. Lucy followed her until the top of the stairs, where she turned left but Buffy turned right. Lucy looked at her cousin with confusion. She was pretty sure that she hadn’t been out of the house for so long that she’d forgotten where everything was.</p>
<p>“Well, one of you is at the wrong door,” Aunt Joy said. She stood halfway between Lucy and Buffy with her arms crossed, trying to look stern and failing miserably thanks to the smile that kept appearing on her face.</p>
<p>“I bet it’s Lucy,” Buffy said. She was smiling too.</p>
<p>Lucy looked back and forth between them. Then, ever so slowly, she walked over to where Buffy was standing and opened the door to the third bedroom. In place of the mess of papers, boxes and canvases that she expected to see was a perfectly organized bedroom. Sky blue and mint green flower patterned curtains were thrown open, bathing the pale blue walls and white furniture in sunlight. A double bed was against one wall with a short bookcase next to it acting as a nightstand. A larger bookcase was next to the desk that sat under the window that faced the side of the house. The second window had a full length mirror directly opposite it in between the closet and the door that led to Aunt Joy’s room.</p>
<p>The bookcases already had Lucy collection of books and cassette tapes on the shelves. Her cassette player was on the nightstand along with a framed photo of her four-year-old self and her parents. There were more photos on the desk, most of which she had never seen before. They had been taken in Sunnydale.</p>
<p>Lucy stared. She blinked. She stared some more. “I... you... What?”</p>
<p>“Do you like it?” Aunt Joy asked.</p>
<p>Lucy gaped at the room for a few more seconds before she whirled around and threw her arms around her aunt. “I love it! Thank you, thank you, thank you!” She jumped on Buffy and gave her a hug too. “Thank you!”</p>
<p> There were smiles all around. Lucy hugged Aunt Joy one more time for good measure and grinned at Buffy. “Looks like you won’t be waking me up with your snoring anymore.”</p>
<p>Buffy elbowed Lucy gently. “I’m not the one who snores.”</p>
<p>Aunt Joy chuckled and shook her head.</p>
<p>Even though she was excited to have her own room, Lucy’s new surroundings were unfamiliar to her. It took her longer than usual to get to sleep that night. It was windy and the tree outside one window kept tapping against the glass, making her jump each time. Once she’d finally drifted off her dreams were filled with blood and tears.</p>
<p>Blood and tears, and something else. Something that woke her up in the middle of the night with tears on her cheeks and a scream tearing its way out of her throat. Something that left a stabbing ache in her heart. Something important.</p>
<p>She just couldn’t remember what it was.</p>
  </div></div>
<a name="section0017"><h2>17. Ted</h2></a>
<div class="story"><div class="userstuff module">
    
    <p>
  <strong>
    <em>Buffy</em>
  </strong>
</p>
<p>The upcoming dinner with Mom’s mystery boyfriend wasn’t enough to distract Buffy from wanting to hunt down Drusilla and stab a stake into her heart.  She wasn’t sure why she hadn’t done that already. Maybe it was because every time she mentioned it Lucy looked at her like she was talking about killing a puppy. Last time she’d even started crying, well, crying harder since she was already all with the crying after the nightly dream that she couldn’t remember. It had been a week since Lucy had come home from the hospital and she’d woken up screaming almost every night except for Thanksgiving. Buffy was sure that it was Drusilla’s fault, which was the main reason why she really wanted to stake her.</p>
<p>It was Tuesday night and patrol had been a bust. Buffy had gone through all the cemeteries in record time because she’d only run into one vampire. That three second fight hadn’t done anything to make her feel better. When she realized that she was near the warehouse district, she looked in the direction of the factory that Spike and Drusilla had been nesting in before turning around and heading for Angel’s apartment.</p>
<p>Angel opened the door seconds after she knocked. He was holding a half-empty mug in one hand that had a smudge of blood leading up to the rim. His eyes widened slightly when he saw Buffy and he quickly let her in. “What’s wrong?”</p>
<p>“What?” Buffy said. “Nothing’s wrong. What makes you think something’s wrong?”</p>
<p>Angel looked at her without saying anything. He raised his eyebrows slightly.</p>
<p>Buffy sighed. “Lucy doesn’t want me to slay Drusilla.”</p>
<p>Angel took a sip of his blood. “And?”</p>
<p>“And I don’t want to make her upset.” Buffy collapsed on the couch. “But she’s been having nightmares and I know that’s Drusilla’s fault. Plus, you know, Drusilla vampire, me Slayer. Staking her is kind of in the job description.”</p>
<p>Angel sat down next to her. He turned the mug of blood around in his hands. He spoke slowly, like he was choosing his words carefully. “Lucy and Drusilla are closely linked. If you kill Drusilla then there’s no telling what would happen to Lucy. She could die or go mad. Or nothing could happen at all.”</p>
<p>“So I do nothing?” Buffy frowned and crossed her arms. She didn’t want to hurt Lucy in any way, shape or form, but Drusilla was already doing that. She didn’t like the idea of sitting back and letting it happen, not when there was a chance she could stop it. A slim chance, probably one in a million, maybe one in a billion. Okay, so the odds weren’t good at all. That didn’t mean that she couldn’t do <em>something</em>.</p>
<p>Angel seemed to notice that she was majorly with the grumpy. “Ask Giles for help. I’ll look into it too. We’ll figure out something, Buffy.”</p>
<p>Buffy took a deep breath and felt herself relaxing, but only a little. “Hopefully we find something soon. I hate feeling helpless.”</p>
<p>“Me too,” Angel murmured, staring into the depths of his mug.</p>
<p>When Buffy got home, Mom was in the kitchen talking frantically on the phone. She looked out into the hallway when Buffy closed the front door behind her. “Oh, Buffy, thank goodness! Do you know where Lucy is? Mr. Giles hasn’t seen her.”</p>
<p>“Lucy’s gone?” Buffy asked. “Since when?”</p>
<p>“Less than an hour. I popped out to get some milk.” Mom spoke into the phone again. “Thank you, Mr. Giles. Yes, we’ll call you. Thank you.” She hung up.</p>
<p>Buffy looked around. From where she was standing she could see most of the first floor and nothing seemed to be out of place. There weren’t any signs of a struggle. “Have you been upstairs? Does it look like there was a fight there?”</p>
<p>Mom shook her head. “Nothing. Mr. Giles is going to see if Lucy is at school. I called Willow too.”</p>
<p>“What about Oz?” Buffy suggested. “His house is down the road.”</p>
<p>Mom’s eyes widened. “Could you run over and check, Buffy? I’ll see if I can find phone numbers for any of the other boys.”</p>
<p>Buffy nodded and darted back out the door. She ran so fast that the houses she passed were all one big blur and stopped in front of Oz’s driveway. The lights were on and she could hear music playing inside.</p>
<p>The door was answered by Oz, who immediately stepped to the side to let Buffy in. “She’s in the living room,” he said.</p>
<p>Lucy was sitting on Oz’s couch hugging a pillow to her chest. Her eyes were bloodshot. She’d been crying again. Her eyes flickered briefly to Buffy as she entered the room before she returned to staring blankly into space. Buffy sat down next to her and put a hand on her shoulder.</p>
<p>“Drusilla is calling me,” Lucy said. “I didn’t want to be alone.”</p>
<p>“You can hear her?” Buffy asked. “Right now?”</p>
<p>Lucy nodded slowly. “I have to go, Buffy. I have to answer her. She won’t stop until I do.”</p>
<p>Buffy tightened her grip on Lucy’s shoulder. That sounded like a bad idea. The image of Drusilla biting into Lucy’s neck flashed across Buffy’s mind. Yeah, that was definitely a bad idea.</p>
<p>“I have to,” Lucy sobbed. “I have to...” She buried her face in the pillow.</p>
<p>Buffy looked up at Oz, who she’d forgotten was in the room until that point. She gave him a pleading look. She didn’t know what to do. He shrugged and shook his head. He didn’t know what to do either.</p>
<p>“I’m not going to let you walk to your death,” Buffy said.</p>
<p>Lucy turned her head so that she was looking at Buffy. “Then come with me. Drusilla and Spike didn’t have many minions left before the ritual and most of those have probably left by now with only Drusilla there. We can handle that.”</p>
<p>Somehow Lucy convinced her that <em>that </em>was a good idea. Buffy called her mom to let her know where they were going, thanked Oz for looking after Lucy, and was soon studying the outside of the factory with suspicion from across the street. Lucy was standing next to her, twisting her hands together nervously.</p>
<p>“I can go in by myself,” Lucy whispered. “I’ll be fine.” Buffy didn’t know if she was trying to convince her or herself.</p>
<p>“Not happening,” Buffy whispered back. She took a stake out of her jacket. “Let’s go.”</p>
<hr/>
<p>Lucy opened the door and walked straight into the factory. Her nervousness seemed to be forgotten. Buffy followed half a step behind her. She scanned the inside of the factory, looking at every place where a minion could be hiding. It seemed to be empty except for them and one lone vampire sitting at the table in the middle of the factory floor reading a book. He looked up and his eyes widened behind his round glasses. He looked like he was about thirty before he put his game face on.</p>
<p>“Dalton,” Lucy said, “is Drusilla downstairs?”</p>
<p>The vampire nodded. “Yes. Yes, she is.” He looked at Buffy with fear in his yellow eyes.</p>
<p>Lucy looked from the vampire to Buffy and back again. “I’m going to go downstairs. If I need help I’ll scream. Don’t kill each other.”</p>
<p>As Lucy disappeared deeper into the factory, Buffy and the vampire eyed each other from across the factory floor. The vampire swallowed nervously.</p>
<p>Buffy’s Slayer hearing picked up the faint murmurs of voices. They were too quiet or too far away for her to clearly make out what they were saying, but one of them seemed to be singing. Buffy tilted her head towards the voices, trying to hear more. Eventually she gave it up as a bad job and turned her full attention back to the vampire in the room with her. He was frozen in place at the table, his book lying open in front of him. Buffy was tempted to go over and poke him to see if he’d react.</p>
<p>After a few minutes during which neither Buffy or the vampire moved more than a foot in any direction, Buffy heard footsteps coming upstairs. Lucy appeared out of the shadows on one side of the factory. She didn’t seem to have any injuries but she was frowning slightly.</p>
<p>“We can go now,” Lucy said. She turned to the vampire. “Good to see you, Dalton.”</p>
<p>The vampire made a strangled sound.</p>
<p>They walked away from the factory in silence. Lucy was still frowning. That was a thinking hard look if Buffy ever saw one. Between Willow and Giles, Buffy knew not to interrupt a thinking hard look.</p>
<p>After a few blocks, Lucy finally spoke. “Spike is alive.”</p>
<p>Buffy stopped walking. Lucy made it to the next streetlamp before she stopped and turned back.</p>
<p>The first thing Buffy wanted to do was ask if she was sure, but she knew that was a stupid question. Of course Lucy was sure. She had spent more time with Spike than anyone except Drusilla and Angel, she would know if whoever she saw was him.</p>
<p>“How is he?” Buffy asked instead.</p>
<p>“His spine is broken and he’s got some burns, but he’ll heal.” Lucy quickly added, “But he’s not dangerous right now. Can we keep this between us? Just for now? I mean, you know and that’s what’s important, right? And you guys aren’t going to be trying to kill each other any time soon because injuries. And—”</p>
<p>Buffy interrupted her. “Ease up on the Willow-babble. Breathe.”</p>
<p>Lucy stopped talking and took huge gasps of air. She coughed a few times.</p>
<p>“We’re telling Giles,” Buffy said after Lucy had visibly calmed down.</p>
<p>Lucy seemed to sense that Buffy wasn’t leaving any room for argument. She nodded. “Only Mr. Giles.”</p>
<p>“Only Giles,” Buffy agreed. Giles was the least likely person to go running into the factory to dust Spike without telling anyone and without a plan.</p>
<p>“Thank you.” Lucy spoke so softly that Buffy would almost have not heard her if she hadn’t been a Slayer. She looked down at her shoes.</p>
<p>“You’re welcome.” Buffy gave Lucy’s arm a gentle squeeze. “Let’s go home.”</p>
<p>Giles wasn’t happy to learn that Spike and Drusilla were still alive, injuries or not. Lucy was watching from the foot of Buffy’s bed while Buffy listened to him pacing over the phone.</p>
<p>“It doesn’t seem right to stake him when he can’t fight back,” Buffy said.</p>
<p>“He is a vampire,” Giles reminded her, as if she had somehow forgotten.</p>
<p>“Yup,” Buffy said.</p>
<p>Giles sighed.</p>
<p>“Just this once?” Buffy suggested. “If Spike tries to attack me, or anyone, I’ll totally stake him.”</p>
<p>“Alright, just this once,” Giles agreed. “Now do go to sleep. You have school tomorrow.”</p>
<hr/>
<p>Mom’s panic over Lucy going missing in Sunnydale at night while she was immunocompromised kept her hovering over Lucy and Buffy until two weeks later, when two stress-making events arrived in quick succession. Lucy had a bone marrow test after school and also Lucy was going back to school. Mom hovered so much that Buffy doubted they’d ever leave the house. It took a combination of begging, cajoling and guilt-tripping from Buffy and Lucy to get Mom in the car, and then Lucy had to make a million promises before Mom would let her go into the school building. They almost weren’t late for class, but then Lucy dragged Buffy into the washroom to help her check her hair, which she was sure was going to start falling out any minute.</p>
<p>“It looks fine, Lucy,” Buffy said for the third time. “Cross my heart.”</p>
<p>Lucy shook her head. “I don’t get it. Last time I lost all my hair.”</p>
<p>“Well, maybe it’s different this time because...” Buffy paused to think of a reason. “Because it’s different.” The bell rang. “Can we go to class now?”</p>
<p>The library was abnormally full at lunch. Oz and the other members of Dingoes Ate My Baby were all there with Buffy, Willow and Xander to celebrate Lucy being back. Giles stuck his head out of his office and Buffy was sure he was debating if it would be worth facing down Snyder if he got caught not supervising them. Then he sighed and put only the checkout counter and a giant book between them and him instead of walls and a door.</p>
<p>The close eye that Buffy kept on Lucy after her bone marrow test turned out to be unnecessary. She didn’t get sick like she did the last time. Buffy was happy about that. Lucy’s delirium had been scary and, well, hospitals were scary. She hoped that they would both be able to avoid hospitals for at least a month.</p>
<p>The Summers house was in a state of total chaos on Friday evening. Mom was trying to prepare ahead of time for the dinner she wanted to make when her mystery boyfriend came over on Saturday. Buffy could hear her hurrying around downstairs, which was a problem because she was supposed to be listening to Giles while he told her over the phone exactly how she had to kill the trio of shapeshifting demons that had attacked Sunnydale High that morning. It was complicated. She was taking notes.</p>
<p>“So holy water first, then silver knife?” she asked.</p>
<p>Giles sighed. “The holy water goes on the silver knife.”   </p>
<p>“Okay.” Buffy made the correction. “And then I put the chicken in the fire.” She blinked abruptly. “There’s a chicken?”</p>
<p>“No, there is no chicken. Have you been listening at all?” Giles paused. “Are you feeling alright?”</p>
<p>“I’m fine.” Buffy crossed out everything that she had written. “Can we go over this from the top?”</p>
<p>Giles sighed again. “Yes, Buffy, we can. Listen carefully. Anoint the silver knife with holy water...”</p>
<p>The shapeshifters were all taken care of an hour later with no damage to Buffy’s outfit. When Buffy got home she nearly collided with Lucy in the entryway. Her cousin was pacing in front of the door with her arms crossed.</p>
<p>“Drusilla is calling again,” Lucy said in a low voice.</p>
<p>“Oh.” Buffy bit her lip. She really wanted to take a shower and go straight to bed. “Do you want me to go with you?”</p>
<p>Lucy pursed her lips. She eyed the bag of shapeshifter slaying supplies that Buffy was carrying. “No. If Drusilla wants me there she can wait until after sunrise.” She squinted. “I think you’re dripping holy water on the floor.”</p>
<p>Buffy looked down at the water leaking out of the bag and the puddle of water at her feet. She groaned. She was going to have to clean that up before she could go to sleep. Well, at least it was only water.</p>
<p>There was more cleanup to do the next morning. Ever since Mom had found out about Buffy being the Slayer, Buffy had gotten more use out of her strategic instincts, which meant that she had left weapons and holy water in pretty much every room in the house. She had to get those weapons back to her room before Mom’s boyfriend arrived. Lucy slipped into her room as she was putting the last of her axes in their old hiding place under her mattress.</p>
<p>Lucy closed the door behind her. “Do you still have bandages up here?”</p>
<p>Buffy stood and brushed off her pants. She was wearing a really cute pair of jeans with pink patches over her knees. “Yeah. Why?”</p>
<p>In response, Lucy rolled up her sleeve. The gaping wound in her left forearm was barely recognizable as a vampire bite and it was still weeping blood.   </p>
<p>Buffy swore. “That looks like it needs stitches!”</p>
<p>“It’s not that deep. I can still move everything.” Lucy wiggled the fingers of her left hand and winched. “It’ll heal. It probably won’t even scar.”</p>
<p>Vampire bites did tend not to scar, even for normal humans. But this one looked really deep.</p>
<p>“I still think you should go to the hospital.” And Buffy couldn’t believe she was saying that. She hated hospitals.</p>
<p>“How long until dinner?” Lucy asked.</p>
<p>The answer to that question was less than four hours, plenty of time to get Lucy to the hospital for stitches and get back before Mom got home. The only problem was getting to the hospital.</p>
<p>“Help me get it cleaned up,” Lucy said. “If you can see bone then we’ll ask Mr. Giles or Oz to drive us.”</p>
<p>Once most of the blood had been washed away Buffy could see that Lucy was right, the wound wasn’t that deep, it was just messy. She finished cleaning it and added a layer of Neosporin before wrapping it in gauze.</p>
<p>“Was this Spike or Drusilla?” Buffy secured the ends of the dressing and poked at Lucy’s arm to make sure the bandage wasn’t too tight.</p>
<p>Lucy shook her head. “Spike. He apologized.” She shook her head again. Buffy didn’t know why.</p>
<p>“Are you okay?” Buffy asked.</p>
<p>“Yeah,” Lucy said. “I’m fine, just tired. I’m going to take a nap, unless you need help cleaning up.”</p>
<p>Buffy shook her head. “It’s almost done. I put some of the holy water in your room.”</p>
<p>“Okay.” Lucy covered the bandage with her sleeve and left the room.</p>
<hr/>
<p>Mom’s boyfriend arrived precisely at six o’clock with a bottle of wine and an apple pie for dessert. His name was Ted. He was a salesman. He was sort of good-looking, a little. That mullet wasn’t doing him any favours. He kept smiling and talking and laughing. Mom smiled and talked and laughed too. Buffy and Lucy did not. Buffy gave one word answers when she was talked to directly and Lucy didn’t even manage that much, saying maybe one syllable for every three questions. That didn’t seem to matter though. Mom and Ted kept the conversation going well enough on their own.</p>
<p>“Time for dessert,” Ted said with a grin as soon as everyone had cleaned their plates. “I made the pie from scratch. You’re going to love it.”</p>
<p>Lucy made a small sound that Buffy was sure neither of the adults had heard. Buffy kicked her softly under the table and gave her a questioning look when their gazes met. Lucy quickly flicked her eyes in the direction of the stairs before she turned to Mom.</p>
<p>“I’m not feeling that great,” Lucy said. “May I be excused?”</p>
<p>Mom’s face softened. “Of course. Let me know as soon as anything changes.”</p>
<p>Lucy nodded and slowly made her way upstairs. She actually looked like she felt sick. Buffy was pretty sure she was faking it. Probably.  </p>
<p>Buffy waited a few seconds before she made her own excuse. “I’m not really feeling up to dessert right now either. I could go sit with Lucy so there’s a fast response if anything goes wrong. Plus that gives you guys some alone time.” They didn’t need to know that Buffy would be able to hear anything that happened perfectly fine.</p>
<p>Mom and Ted looked at each other. “Ted is here to get to know you and Lucy, Buffy,” Mom said.</p>
<p>Buffy kept trying. “We can take a break before dessert. The pie Ted brought looks delicious, but I’m full.”</p>
<p>Mom finally agreed that they could have dessert later. Buffy held herself back from running upstairs.</p>
<p>“He’s not human,” Lucy said as soon as Buffy stepped into her room. She was sitting on the edge of her bed with a bottle of holy water well within reach.</p>
<p>“I thought I felt something Hellmouthy,” Buffy muttered. “How do you know?”</p>
<p>Lucy bit her lip. “There’s something I should tell you...”</p>
<p>So Lucy could read minds. That was new, or not so new. She could read minds, but she couldn’t read Ted’s mind, ergo Ted wasn’t human. He wasn’t a vampire either. Any other species of demon was possible though, since Lucy hadn’t been going around trying to read the minds of everyone in the Shelter. Apparently it gave her a headache.</p>
<p>After a few more minutes of discussion, Buffy gathered a few weapons and went downstairs to protect her mom while Lucy started looking through the books she’d borrowed from Giles to see if she could find anything about what type of demon Ted was. Buffy would be keeping Lucy updated by thinking about it, which was something that she wasn’t going to get used to any time soon.</p>
<p>Buffy picked at her uneaten slice of apple pie while Mom and Ted kept making eyes at each other. <em>So much for being here to meet us</em>, she thought. Ted didn’t attack them though, so she called the night a win.</p>
<p>Lucy didn’t find anything useful in the books she had. When Buffy got back from patrolling she was on the phone in Buffy’s room talking to Giles. From what Buffy could hear he hadn’t been able to find anything yet either. Buffy wondered what Lucy had told him. The whole mind-reader thing was filed under Big Secret so she must have come up with a good lie to explain why she and Buffy thought that Ted was a demon.</p>
<p>After another hour, Lucy hung up the phone. She sighed. “Nothing. Unless Ted has a tail?”</p>
<p>Buffy shook her head. “No tail, no horns, no scales. Not that I could see.”</p>
<p>Lucy muttered something under her breath in a language that wasn’t English or Latin, both of which Buffy would have recognized. She scribbled a few words and drew some arrows on the pieces of paper she had spread out on the floor among the open books. “That narrows it down to about thirty-three thousand four hundred and twenty-eight species.” She frowned and drew a few more lines. “Make that thirty-three thousand four hundred and twenty-seven point five.”</p>
<p>Buffy groaned and flopped onto her bed. “What are we going to tell my mom?”</p>
<p>“‘We think Ted is a demon. Does he happen to have a prehensile tail?’” Lucy suggested. “I don’t know. He hasn’t hurt her.”</p>
<p>“But he isn’t of the good either.” Buffy rolled over and stared at the ceiling. “I can tell.”</p>
<p>There was a quiet click as Lucy picked up the phone again. “I’m calling Angel.”</p>
<p>Buffy sat up. “Why?”</p>
<p>“Because he can smell a drop of blood from a mile away.” Lucy dialed Angel’s number and held the phone up to her ear. “He can help narrow down species by scent.”</p>
<p>That sounded like a good idea.</p>
<p>Mom knocked on the door while the phone was ringing. “Buffy? Lucy? You should go to sleep now, girls.”</p>
<p>“Slayer stuff, Mom,” Buffy called through the door.</p>
<p> Buffy and Lucy looked at each other. It wasn’t technically a lie.</p>
<p>“Okay,” Mom said after a few seconds of silence. “Don’t stay up too late.” Her footsteps went down the hall to her own room.</p>
<p>Angel agreed to come over to see if he recognized Ted’s scent. Buffy went to tell Mom that he would be helping them and got a wordless murmur in response. Mom was already half asleep.</p>
<p>Angel frowned as soon as he smelled the air in the dining room. “Lucy, you’re not taking any medication, right?”</p>
<p>Lucy shook her head. “No. Why?”</p>
<p>“I smell something medicinal.” He breathed in again. “It’s a tranquilizer, maybe. I ran into something similar during World War Two.”</p>
<p>There shouldn’t have been any tranquilizers in the house, at least, not in the dining room. Angel sniffed around some more and eventually found the highest concentration of the scent in the foil-wrapped apple pie sitting out on the kitchen counter. Buffy glared at it. Ted said he’d made that pie himself.</p>
<p>“I think it’s time to sic Willow on him,” Buffy said.</p>
<p>Willow started running her search the next morning. She called Buffy at around noon to report that she hadn’t found anything. “He hasn’t even gotten a parking ticket.” The sound of Willow typing on her laptop’s keyboard travelled over the phone lines. “I’m going to keep looking though.”</p>
<p>“Thanks, Wills.” Buffy hung up the phone.</p>
<p>Lucy was still looking for a species of demon that Ted could be. Angel had also mentioned smelling motor oil, so the demons on the shortlist (if more than thirty thousand demons could be called a shortlist) became more motorized and less animalistic. Buffy looked over her shoulder once and saw a picture of a human-looking demon that had an engine instead of a heart. Another time there was a copper-coloured robot demon girl who ran on steam power and had rocket boots. Buffy wondered if Giles knew that steam-powered robot demons were a thing. Who was she kidding? He totally did.</p>
<p>Buffy planned to spend most of the day pacing around her room and answering the phone whenever Willow or Giles called. Those plans were dashed when Ted arrived and dragged all of them out to play miniature golf. He very cheerfully would not take no for an answer.</p>
<p>“I’m going to take care of you girls,” Ted said to Buffy while they were waiting for Mom and Lucy to finish the second-to-last hole. “And I’m going to make your mother very happy. I’m not wired for anything else.”</p>
<p>“Uh huh.” Buffy inched away from Ted.</p>
<p>Ted’s hand shot out. He grabbed Buffy’s arm, squeezing it painfully. “You are being very impolite. Speak clearly.”</p>
<p>“Let go of me!” Buffy wrenched her arm free with most of her strength. Another point to Ted not being human, his fingers were all on one piece after that. “What are you?”</p>
<p>The cheery smile on Ted’s face didn’t waver. “Now, what makes you ask something like that?”</p>
<p>Buffy glared. “I know you’re not human.”</p>
<p>Ted laughed. “What a silly thing to say. You must have a very big imagination, young lady.” He narrowed his eyes and lowered his voice. “Or you really want to spend the rest of your life locked away in a padded room.”</p>
<p>Buffy took another step back. “You can’t do that.”</p>
<p>Ted’s smile brightened. “Your mother and I are going to be very happy together. I’m not going to let anything get in the way.” He turned to Mom and Lucy, who were walking towards them. “Great job, ladies! On to the last hole! We’ll see if anyone can dethrone Joyce.”</p>
<p>They didn’t get to finish the last hole. Buffy hit her ball with so much force that it went flying twenty feet into the parking lot and cracked the windshield of the car that it landed on. Luckily the woman who owned the car wasn’t too upset because she was selling the car to the junkyard the next day, but Buffy still had to apologize several times.</p>
<p>“Are you okay?” Lucy whispered to Buffy on the way home.</p>
<p>Buffy smiled. “I’m fine.” She looked at the driver’s seat where Ted was and then back at Lucy, who nodded slightly after a few seconds. Buffy hoped that meant that she’d gotten the message that they should talk about this later.</p>
<p>Both phones were ringing off the hook when they got home. Buffy ran upstairs to answer the one in her room. It was Willow. She started babbling at full speed as soon as Buffy said hello and didn’t slow down until Buffy said her name several times.</p>
<p>“Okay, from the top, slowly, Willow,” Buffy said.</p>
<p>“Ted killed his wives!” Willow said.</p>
<p>Buffy blinked. “What?”</p>
<p>“I found four marriage certificates and I called you but you didn’t answer so I called Xander and we went to the address I found and Ted wasn’t home so we kind of broke in and looked around and we found his wives’ bodies.”  Willow paused to take a breath that was probably meant to help slow her down. “So we went to a pay phone and called the police because we usually call the police when there are bodies but we didn’t say who we were and we lied about how we’d found them and then Xander thought we should wait to make sure they found the bodies so we hid across the street and then when had to sneak away because the police closed off the street so we used the sewers and—”</p>
<p>“Breath, Wills,” Buffy said.</p>
<p>Willow gasped. “So, yeah. I’ve been trying to call you to let you know.”</p>
<p>“Okay.” Buffy’s brain caught up with the Willow-babble and she swore. The four letter word would have been loud enough to hear downstairs if she hadn’t choked on it. “I’ll call you back.”</p>
<p>The police came to the house ten minutes later looking for Ted. They found three women who drowned them in lies, excuses and double-talk. Once the police were out the door, Buffy turned to Lucy, who was standing in front of the closet they had stuffed Ted’s remains in.</p>
<p>“So, did we know Ted was a robot?” Buffy asked.</p>
<p>Lucy shook her head.  “Mr. Giles thought he was an Andanika.”</p>
<p>Buffy hummed noncommittally. “The spell he gave you worked though.”</p>
<p>“Yeah.” Lucy put the container of salt she was still holding down on the counter. “I never want to see salt melting skin again, even if it is robot skin.”</p>
<p>Buffy had to agree with that. Watching Ted’s face melt off had been very disturbing.</p>
<p>Mom sat down hard on one of the stools at the kitchen island. Well, it was the only stool now. She had used the other one to hit Ted in the head after his robotness had been revealed and it had broken into a million pieces that they had also thrown into the closet. “Is this normal for you?”</p>
<p>Buffy nodded. “Remind me to tell you about Willow’s robot boyfriend. And Xander’s mummy girlfriend. And that Bratza demon girl Lucy went for coffee with.”</p>
<p>“It’s Britzai,” Lucy corrected. “And she never tried to kill me.”</p>
<p>Mom gave a tired laugh. “I move that we all research people before dating them. All in favour say ‘aye’.”</p>
<p>“Aye,” Buffy and Lucy chorused.</p>
<p>They were all silent for a few minutes. Buffy examined her chipped manicure. She would probably have time to fix that today.</p>
<p>“So, what are we going to do with Ted?” Lucy asked.</p>
<p>The three of them looked towards the closet. “Hanukkah is coming,” Buffy said. “Maybe Willow would like a robot to dissect.”</p>
  </div><div class="fff_chapter_notes fff_foot_notes"><b>Notes for the Chapter:</b><blockquote class="userstuff">
          <p>No, I didn't make a mistake. Extra chapter this week, because reasons.</p>
        </blockquote></div></div>
<a name="section0018"><h2>18. Surprise and Innocence</h2></a>
<div class="story"><div class="userstuff module">
    
    <p>
  <strong>
    <em>Lucy</em>
  </strong>
</p>
<p>“Slayer’s birthday’s next week, innit?” Spike asked.</p>
<p>Lucy looked up from the scrap of paper she was trying to outline an essay on. Spike was sitting up on the bed in the same spot Drusilla had sat when she was the one who was weak and he was taking care of her. His jacket was hanging on the back of the chair in front of the vanity. Drusilla had helped him sit up and then gone off to do who knows what, leaving Lucy with orders to entertain him. Luckily, Spike seemed to find listening to her curse her English teacher, Principal Snyder and the school system entertaining. Lucy didn’t want to know what would happen if she didn’t follow Drusilla’s orders.</p>
<p>“How do you know that?” She shifted her perch on the end of the bed, tucking her feet to one side.</p>
<p>Spike smirked, twisting the burns on his face. “I have my ways. So, anything special planned?”</p>
<p>Lucy raised her eyebrows. “Would I tell you if there was?”</p>
<p>“Depends on what mood you’re in.” There was a mischievous glint in Spike’s eyes. “You feeling brave tonight, kitten?”</p>
<p>Lucy leaned slightly towards him. “You can hear my heartbeat, you tell me.”</p>
<p>Spike chuckled. “Calm and relaxed as ever, now that you’re not working on the, what did you call it? ‘Stupid hellspawn from hell’?”</p>
<p>“That sounds better in Latin,” Lucy said. She thought for a second. “It would sound even better in Etruscan.”</p>
<p>“I’m sure it would.” Spike patted the spot next to him. “Come on, take a break. Put your feet up.”</p>
<p>Lucy folded the wrinkled paper and put it safely in her pocket. She curled up next to Spike with her shoes carefully not touching the bed. She’d gone to a laundromat a few nights before and washed the ashes out of the bedding, she wasn’t going to be the one to get dirt all over it.</p>
<p>Spike put his arm around her. “So, Slayer’s birthday. You having a party?”</p>
<p>“I’m not telling you.” Lucy felt herself relaxing into his touch. She knew it was bad but she couldn’t stop it. She didn’t want to stop it.</p>
<p>They sat in comfortable silence. They did that a lot lately. With Spike’s injuries they couldn’t go anywhere and Lucy was often so tired that they couldn’t keep up a conversation (though, thankfully, that had hardly anything to do with her leukemia, which her test results declared firmly in remission). That night was no exception. There had been an incident with body-snatching Bezoar offspring at school the day before and Lucy had yet to recover from being a puppet of a prehistoric parasite.</p>
<p>“I never did thank you, did I?” Lucy said after what had to have been almost half an hour of silence. “For staying with me when I was sick.”</p>
<p>“Not once,” Spike said.</p>
<p>“Thank you.” Lucy put her head on his shoulder. “It helped.”</p>
<p>The soft sleeve of Spike’s shirt brushed Lucy’s cheek as he moved. Lucy sat up and looked at him questioningly. Spike responded by touching her jaw with the tips of his fingers. They’d been in contact for long enough that Spike’s hand was almost warm.</p>
<p>“I’m about to do something stupid,” Spike murmured. “Fair warning.”</p>
<p>Lucy would have asked for more detail, but Spike didn’t give her the chance. He leaned closer and their lips met, so gently that it could have been an accident were it not for his arm wrapping around her waist to pull her towards him. Lucy made a small sound that was lost in the pounding of blood in her ears. She searched for Spike’s free hand and laced her fingers with his.</p>
<p>“Oh,” Lucy said once one of them had broken off the kiss. Probably her, since she was the only one who needed to breathe. “Stupid?”</p>
<p>“Very.” Spike’s eyes flashed yellow for a split second. “Slayer’ll have my head if I sire you by accident.”</p>
<p>A laugh burst from Lucy’s lips. “And you think she won’t if it’s on purpose?”</p>
<p>“A fellow can hope.” Spike studied her face like he was trying to memorize it. Lucy met his gaze. They were silent for a time.</p>
<p>“And Drusilla?” Lucy asked. Her stomach twisted sharply at the thought of what Drusilla might do if, no, <em>when </em>she found out that Lucy had been kissing her boyfriend.</p>
<p>Spike smirked. “She likes you well enough. I call dibs on getting to watch when the clothes come off.”</p>
<p>Lucy squeaked and looked away. She knew her face had to be bright red. Spike’s laughter could probably be heard outside the factory.</p>
<hr/>
<p>It was quiet during the week leading up to Buffy’s birthday. Aside from the day when Xander got possessed by an Agareth demon (and learned a truly impressive number of swear words that got him stuck in detention before they could exorcise it) there were only normal vampire dustings and the odd flesh-eating demon that could be killed almost without Slayer powers. This meant that Lucy, Willow, Xander and Mr. Giles had plenty of time to plan Buffy’s surprise party. Oz and Devon somehow got them permission to use the Bronze after they closed on Sunday and they brought Angel on board to get Buffy there on time. The party planning seemed to be going a little too smoothly. Lucy wouldn’t have been surprised if Buffy arrived the night of by being kicked through the door of the Bronze.</p>
<p>The night of the party rolled around. It was actually the night before Buffy’s birthday since they all stayed up past midnight most nights anyway so being awake to wish Buffy happy birthday the second it was her birthday seemed like the logical thing to do. Lucy got dressed up and headed out before Buffy started patrolling. The Dingoes were playing the last set at the Bronze that night and they would put up the decorations for the party afterwards. Lucy hoped that Buffy would be okay with Devon, Sam and Soul being there. She didn’t mind when they showed up at research parties.</p>
<p>Drusilla started calling Lucy as the last decorations were going up. The call was a hum in the back of her mind that was easy to ignore at first but steadily grew louder until it was on the edge of being painful. Lucy had never let it go further than that. She tried to negotiate with Drusilla as they waited for the others to arrive, but the vampire was being unusually stubborn. The hum started to be punctuated with images, which was new, and the images were disturbing to say the least. A minute of that was worse than physical pain. Two minutes and Lucy gave in.</p>
<p>“I have to go,” she said.</p>
<p>The boys looked at her. Oz raised an eyebrow.</p>
<p>“Drusilla.” Lucy shook her head. “I have to go. I— Tell Buffy I’m sorry.”</p>
<p>“I’ll go with you,” Devon said.</p>
<p>Lucy shook her head again. “No. She’ll kill you. I’ll be back as soon as I can, I promise.” She grabbed a stake and a plastic squeeze bottle of holy water from her bag and tucked both into one of the many pockets of her dark green canvas jacket (a belated birthday gift from the other Dingoes) as she ran out the door.</p>
<p>Drusilla was pleased.</p>
<p>At the factory, the vampires seemed to be decorating for their own party. Drusilla was happily creating flower arrangements at the table while Spike sat off to the side in a wheelchair watching and smiling at her.</p>
<p>Drusilla abandoned her flower arrangement when Lucy entered. She walked as if she was floating with her new red dress flowing around her legs. She smiled at Lucy. “It’s my birthday. You’re invited to the party.”</p>
<p>It was Drusilla’s birthday too? Lucy hadn’t known that. Though it was possible that it wasn’t actually Drusilla’s birthday, just a day when she felt like having a party and tea with her dolls wouldn’t do.</p>
<p>Lucy carefully watched for Drusilla’s reaction as she spoke. “Thank you, Dru. When’s the party?”</p>
<p>“When the catchfly has two wings. Don’t be late.” With that Drusilla went back to her flowers, leaving Lucy utterly confused.</p>
<p>After standing frozen for a few seconds Lucy crossed the factory floor and made her way towards Spike. He watched her progress languidly. When she was a few feet away he wheeled his chair over and pulled her into his lap. Lucy took a beat to recover from the resulting ungainly flailing of her limbs.</p>
<p>“The party’s tomorrow night,” Spike said. “How’re you?”</p>
<p>Lucy nodded. “Fine, thanks. You?”</p>
<p>“Never better. Dalton stole me some wheels so I’m not stuck in bed anymore.” Spike smirked. “Though you didn’t seem to mind that.”</p>
<p>Lucy felt her face heat up. Spike laughed.</p>
<p>“Evil,” Lucy muttered. Not that she could forget it, but the verbal reminder made her feel better.</p>
<p>And, okay, maybe she forgot sometimes.</p>
<p>Spike’s arm was wrapped around her waist. She felt him loosen his grip and run his hand slowly down the side of her leg. She shivered. Then she grabbed his wrist, stopping him. The likelihood of that leading somewhere that she didn’t want to go, especially with an audience there, was too high for comfort.</p>
<p>“I don’t think this chair was meant to hold two people.” Lucy stood up and dropped Spike’s hand.</p>
<p> A flash of something crossed Spike’s face, anger or confusion, or both. His jaw tightened.</p>
<p>Lucy lowered her voice. “It’s Drusilla’s birthday. Be fair.” She knew he wouldn’t care that Drusilla and all of the minions were in the room, so she didn’t bother to mention it.</p>
<p>Spike looked past her at the table where Drusilla was presumably still weaving flowers together. “Dru won’t mind. She’d even enjoy it.”</p>
<p>Lucy wasn’t sure that the former was true, but from the few clear pictures she’d gotten from Drusilla’s mind she knew that the latter definitely was.</p>
<p>“I have places to be,” Lucy said. “I’m late. I’ll see you tomorrow.” She turned and walked to the doors. On her way out of the factory she heard one of the minions behind her laughing, followed by a growl and then a crash. She chanced a glance and saw a minion (maybe Frank?) crawling away from the table clutching his crushed, bleeding nose while Spike loomed over him in his wheelchair. Drusilla was looking absolutely thrilled at the whole thing.</p>
<p>Buffy’s birthday party was in full swing by the time Lucy got back to the Bronze. Devon, Sam and Soul were playing some instrumental music up on stage that Willow, Oz, Xander, Cordelia, Angel and Buffy were trying to dance to. Mr. Giles, Aunt Joy and Ms. Calendar were watching from the sidelines, Mr. Giles wincing every so often when the music went wrong. That was usually Devon’s fault. Devon could play guitar but he couldn’t keep up with Sam and Soul, who practiced their instruments umpteen times a week.</p>
<p>Buffy turned on an unintentionally dropped chord and was the first to see Lucy hovering by the door. She abandoned the dance floor with a shriek. “Lucy!”</p>
<p>Lucy staggered backwards when Buffy collided with her and nearly cracked her ribs with a hug. Buffy let go before she could get a word out about not being able to breathe. “Are you hurt?” Buffy demanded.</p>
<p>“No, I’m fine.” Lucy looked for a clock and saw that it was ten minutes after midnight. “Happy birthday.”</p>
<p>Buffy smiled weakly. “Thanks.”</p>
<p>Lucy dragged Buffy back to the dance floor and headed for the stage to relieve Devon from guitar-playing. Angel intercepted her at the edge of the stage where she was boosting herself up because she didn’t feel like wasting time going through doors.</p>
<p>“Spike’s alive?” he asked quietly.</p>
<p>“How—?” Lucy cut herself off and shook her head. Angel could smell Spike’s scent on her, of course. “Yeah, he’s alive. Only Buffy and Mr. Giles know.”</p>
<p>Angel was silent for a second. Then he nodded and went back to dancing (rather badly, in Lucy’s opinion). Lucy hoped that meant he was going to keep the secret.</p>
<p>She finished climbing onto the stage and then nearly had to wrestle Oz’s spare guitar away from Devon. He finally agreed to let her take over after he played a dissonant chord that was not supposed to be in the song and made everyone wince. He muttered something about practising more as he handed the guitar over.</p>
<p>Lucy played with Sam and Soul for a few songs. Then the three of them took a break to eat slices of cake and watch Buffy open her presents. The presents consisted overwhelmingly of clothing. Apparently everyone had the same idea as Lucy, which was that Buffy went through so many outfits that they couldn’t go wrong by getting her new ones. The few exceptions were a pair of blessed daggers from Mr. Giles and a lavender-stuffed pillow from Ms. Calendar.</p>
<p>“It’s supposed to help you sleep,” Ms. Calendar said when she was asked.</p>
<p>Buffy buried her nose in the pillow and smiled. “I think it’ll do great.”</p>
<p>Ms. Calendar smiled back, blushing slightly. Lucy made a note to try to get to know the computer science teacher better. She seemed like Lucy’s kind of person. Lucy was pretty sure Buffy had mentioned Ms. Calendar taking Mr. Giles to watch monster trucks at some point.</p>
<p>They called it quits at around two in the morning. Xander, Willow, Mr. Giles and Ms. Calendar stayed behind to clean up. Cordelia refused, saying that she needed to get at least some sleep, her skin was already going to be a wreck. Lucy helped the guys load the instruments into Oz’s van before she left with Aunt Joy. She was unashamedly relieved to be getting driven home. She felt like she hadn’t had a chance to sit down since last week. Angel and Buffy were walking so that they got to spend more time together. Buffy was the birthday girl, so Aunt Joy hadn’t protested too much.</p>
<p>Lucy fell asleep as soon as her head touched her pillow. Actually, she’d probably fallen asleep before that. When was the last time she’d slept through the night? Before Sunnydale, for sure. Before Quinn died?  Yes. Before her mom died?  Probably. Maybe even before Rose had died. Anyway, she was living around vampire hours now. Sleep at night was a thing of the past.</p>
<p>She didn’t have any dreams, or if she did she couldn’t remember them. She woke up when her alarm went off, thought about rolling over and going back to sleep, and then forced herself to get out of bed. It took far too much willpower to get ready for school and go downstairs for breakfast. A nap was definitely going to take place during lunch, unless they needed to have a research party.</p>
<p>Buffy came to breakfast with a frown on her face.</p>
<p>“Is something wrong?” Lucy asked.</p>
<p>“I had a dream.” Buffy poked at the bowl of cereal that Aunt Joy placed on the countertop in front of her. “I saw Drusilla stake Angel.”</p>
<p>Aunt Joy kissed Buffy’s forehead. “It was just a dream, honey.”</p>
<p>“Slayers have prophetic dreams, Aunt Joy,” Lucy said.</p>
<p>Aunt Joy made a little sound of understanding. “Well, what do you think it means?”</p>
<p>Lucy pointed at Buffy with her spoon. “You already know that Drusilla is alive, so that can’t be it.”</p>
<p>“Well, the obvious answer is that Angel is going to die,” Buffy said slowly.</p>
<p>Lucy started shaking her head before Buffy even finished speaking. She refused to accept that.</p>
<p>“Then it must be some super cryptic warning about the end of the world or something.” Buffy shrugged. She would have looked nonchalant if she wasn’t so tense. “I’ll talk to Giles.”</p>
<p>“You do that,” Aunt Joy said. She gave each of them a hug. “Have a good day at school, girls.”</p>
<p>Lucy would have had a good day if she hadn’t run into Jim and two other boys from the swim team on the way out of school after her last class. The swim team had won nearly every event at their first meet and the boys had gotten cocky as a result. As Lucy walked past Jim and his friends one of them, she wasn’t sure who, slapped her butt. Lucy yelped and spun around. The three boys were laughing.</p>
<p>“What the hell is wrong with you?” Lucy demanded through gritted teeth.</p>
<p>Jim looked at his friends and shrugged, smirking the entire time. “We didn’t do anything.”</p>
<p>For a moment Lucy was tempted to remind Jim how it felt to get punched repeatedly in the face. She breathed in slowly, trying to calm down. Getting into a fight with Jim would not be helpful, especially if she staked him by accident.</p>
<p>“You are a pig, Jim Drake,” Lucy said. “Coach Marin must have made a mistake when he put you on the team. I don’t think he wants mud in the pool.”</p>
<p>One of Jim’s friends laughed. “Catty. You mad because Devon—”</p>
<p>“Think about how you’re going to finish that sentence,” Devon said from a few feet down the hall. He walked over and stood beside Lucy. “Then don’t.”</p>
<p>The boy who had been speaking raised his hands in mock surrender. “Sorry, guess I was wrong. You’re definitely getting in her pants.”</p>
<p>“Don’t punch him, don’t punch him,” Lucy muttered to Devon, who was already curling his hands into fists. In a normal voice she said, “Is sex all swim team boys think about? Because if it is, you guys really need help. That can’t be healthy.”</p>
<p>It took the swim team boys a few seconds to figure out what she was implying, which was a feat because Lucy didn’t even know what she was implying. She had a few ideas though.</p>
<p>“Hey!” Jim’s other friend exclaimed.  </p>
<p>Devon crossed his arms. “Aren’t you guys late to practice? Back off.”</p>
<p>The swim team boys looked at each other. “It’s three against two,” Jim said.</p>
<p>Lucy sighed. “Would you leave and save us all the trouble?”</p>
<p>“We’re going,” Jim’s less annoyed friend said. He pushed the other two down the nearly deserted hall.</p>
<p>“I don’t want to get in your pants,” Devon blurted out as soon as the other boys were gone. “I mean, I can appreciate that you’re attractive but I’m not attracted to you like that. I’m not attracted to anyone like that.” He blushed. “Uh, could you forget that last bit?”</p>
<p>“If it’s important to you? Not a chance.” Lucy smiled at him. “I won’t tell anyone though, and if you want a word to go with that definition I’ll help you look stuff up.” She still occasionally visited some of the online message boards she’d found when she was trying to figure out her sexuality. Learning the word “bisexual” had made so many things click into place.</p>
<p>“Thanks. I’ve got an image to protect.” Devon slung an arm over her shoulders. “Come on, we’re taking over Oz’s garage.”</p>
<p>Band practice ran an hour longer than they usually would have let it go for. Devon wanted to get his guitar playing back up to scratch, so he, Oz and Lucy swapped places every few run-throughs. Without a doubt they sounded the worst when Lucy was on lead guitar and Oz was on vocals. Sam couldn’t stop laughing.</p>
<p>“Okay gang, let’s call it a day,” Devon said. “Go get some sleep.”</p>
<p>Lucy laughed. She wouldn’t be getting any sleep. She had a vampire’s party to go to.</p>
<hr/>
<p>When Lucy arrived at the factory after dinner, vampires were milling around the factory floor drinking a red liquid from metal goblets. It wasn’t blood, Lucy was very familiar with blood, but it could have been wine or some sort of fruit juice. Drusilla pressed a goblet into Lucy’s hands seconds after she arrived. Lucy touched it to her lips without drinking and abandoned it on a table when Drusilla wasn’t looking.</p>
<p>The minions kept coming up to Lucy to make small talk, flashing their fangs in smiles that reduced Lucy’s responses to Oz-like monosyllables. Eventually Dalton came over and was able to slyly send all the others away.</p>
<p>“Thanks,” Lucy said.</p>
<p>Dalton nodded and smiled. He seemed to be about to say something before an absolutely terrified look crossed his face and he hurried away with a polite murmur.</p>
<p>“Having fun?” Spike asked.</p>
<p>Lucy turned to him and crossed her arms. “What do you think?”</p>
<p>Perhaps wisely, Spike didn’t reply. He rolled closer to her and took a canapé off of the plate that one of the minions had given her. “Got these from a wedding,” he said as he chewed. “Didn’t even have to kill anyone.”</p>
<p>“I’m so proud of you,” Lucy said flatly.</p>
<p>Spike snorted and stole another canapé.</p>
<p>After a few minutes, Drusilla clapped her hands to get everyone’s attention. “Our guest of honour is arriving!”</p>
<p>Lucy looked at Spike questioningly. He shrugged.</p>
<p>Drusilla made her way over to them, smiling to herself. “He’s burning up. His insides are all melting.”</p>
<p>“Who, pet?” Spike asked.</p>
<p>“Shhh, it’s a secret.” Drusilla’s smiled widened. “He loves her, he loves her not. The butterfly is leaving.”</p>
<p>“Did you understand any of that?” Lucy asked as Drusilla walked away.</p>
<p>Spike shook his head. “Not a word. I’d better make sure she’s alright.”</p>
<p>Spike rolled after Drusilla, leaving Lucy standing in the corner with an empty plate and the feeling that something bad was going to happen.</p>
<p>This was the Hellmouth. Something bad was always going to happen.</p>
<p>It was only second before Lucy was grabbed from behind, icy fingers digging into her arm. She yelped and turned around as much as she was able to. The empty plate was in her free hand, ready to be used as a weapon if it was needed. When she saw who was holding her, she froze.</p>
<p>“Angel?” Lucy’s voice was wary and drowned out by Drusilla’s delighted shriek.</p>
<p>“Daddy!” Drusilla ran the few feet that she needed to cross before throwing herself into Angel’s arms, breaking his grip on Lucy. Lucy retreated to where Spike was sitting and they watched as Drusilla hugged Angel and spoke about stars and other glittering things. Angel was smiling, thin-lipped and smug. Lucy was confused. On the other hand, Spike seemed to understand.</p>
<p>“Angelus.” Spike rolled closer to Angel and Drusilla. “What brings you back to us, mate? Thought that soul was a no refunds sort of deal.”</p>
<p>Lucy froze. No. It couldn’t be. Spike had to be wrong.</p>
<p>Angel grinned. It wasn’t how he would normally smile, sort of awkward and not lasting more than a second or two. This was a sharp, wolfish grin that oozed confidence. He chuckled. “Guess you were wrong about that. And boy is it good to be back.”</p>
<p>This wasn’t an act. Spike wasn’t wrong. Angelus was back, large as unlife and twice as deadly. Lucy’s breathe caught in her throat and she cursed her heart for beating as wildly as it was. She was dead. She was so dead, and if she was lucky only dead and not undead.</p>
<p>Drusilla drew back from her Daddy. “We’re having a party.”</p>
<p>Angelus’s gaze roved around the room. “Yes, you are.” His eyes settled on Lucy. “Mind if I sample the refreshments?”</p>
<p>“Easy, mate.” Spike said. “Dru has plans for her.”</p>
<p>“I know that.” Angelus smirked at Spike. “Who do you think was the one she came crying to about the two of you when the Watcher and the Slayer couldn’t handle things? You’re so worried about losing your soul, aren’t you Lu?” He chuckled again. “You shouldn’t be. It’s quicker and easier than falling asleep.”</p>
<p>Lucy cleared her throat. She gave herself a point when her voice came out steady. “Then why did it take you a hundred years? That doesn’t say ‘quick and easy’ to me.” And minus a point for baiting the two hundred and forty-five year old vampire who already wanted to kill her.</p>
<p>Angelus growled. He stormed towards her and grabbed her by the throat. He didn’t break her neck and he didn’t crush her windpipe, he just squeezed until she saw stars. When he let go she collapsed to the floor, gasping.</p>
<p>“Run home, Lu,” Angelus said. “Give Buffy my love.”</p>
<p>Lucy looked up at him. Her lips curled into a snarl. “Go to hell.”</p>
<p>Angelus smiled. “Why would I when all the demons are here?”</p>
<hr/>
<p>Buffy wasn’t at home when Lucy got there. Aunt Joy was awake though, and Lucy quickly filled her in on what had happened at Drusilla’s party. Then Lucy burst into tears, shaking uncontrollably. Aunt Joy sat her down on the couch and hugged her until she was calmer. She didn’t say a word about Lucy keeping the fact that Spike wasn’t dust a secret until that moment.</p>
<p>“I’m going to call Mr. Giles,” Aunt Joy said. “He needs to know about this, right?”</p>
<p>Lucy nodded, wiping away tears with her sleeve. Aunt Joy stood and went to the kitchen. After a few seconds Lucy heard her speaking to Mr. Giles. She thought that she could hear Mr. Giles too, exclaiming loudly and shrilly, but that was probably her imagination.</p>
<p>Aunt Joy was on the phone for several minutes. When she came back to the living room Lucy was holding two of the crosses from the dedicated weapons trunk and examining the window frame.</p>
<p>“What are you doing?” Aunt Joy asked.</p>
<p>“Angel was invited into the house,” Lucy said. “That means that Angelus can get in too. Now that you’re in the know, we can go wild with the crosses and holy water.”</p>
<p>Aunt Joy frowned. “The neighbours will still think it’s strange.”</p>
<p>Lucy rolled her eyes. “The neighbours didn’t notice when we killed a robot in our kitchen in the middle of the day. They won’t bat an eye at a few crosses.”</p>
<p>Aunt Joy agreed that that was probably true and they spent the next hour nailing crosses to all the window frames and doors that faced the outside of the house. There were more than enough crosses for all the windows. They attached a few of the extras to the bedroom doors and still had more than a dozen left over. Lucy hadn’t known that they had so many crosses in the house.</p>
<p>“Shouldn’t Buffy be back by now?” Aunt Joy asked when they had put the remaining crosses away.</p>
<p>Lucy looked at the clock. “She usually patrols for another hour if it’s a bad night.”</p>
<p>Angelus being back would definitely make it a bad night.</p>
<p>Aunt Joy still looked worried.</p>
<p>“She’ll call Mr. Giles if she runs into anything difficult,” Lucy said. “He’ll warn her about Angelus.”</p>
<p>“I’m going to wait for her to get back,” Aunt Joy decided. “You should go to bed. You’ve got school tomorrow.”</p>
<p>A yawn cut off Lucy’s protest. “Okay, I’m going. Goodnight.”</p>
<p>When Lucy went downstairs the next morning, Aunt Joy was sitting in the armchair that faced the door with her head resting on the back of the chair, fast asleep. Buffy still wasn’t home. Lucy decided to call Mr. Giles and Willow before she started panicking. As the phone was ringing, the back door opened and Buffy walked into the kitchen. Lucy said a quick “It’s okay, she’s here.” to Mr. Giles before hanging up the phone and turning on Buffy. “Where have you been?”</p>
<p>“Angel’s,” Buffy said. She looked around. “Where’s Mom?”</p>
<p>Lucy crossed her arms. “In the living room, sleeping. She was waiting for you all night.”</p>
<p>Buffy looked down at her feet. “Um...”</p>
<p>Lucy sighed and looked at the clock. They had an hour before they had to leave for school. “Go take a shower. We can talk at school.”</p>
<p>Lucy waited until she heard water running before she went to wake up Aunt Joy. Her aunt blinked slowly and muttered something unintelligible as she woke.</p>
<p>“Buffy’s home,” Lucy said. “Do you want coffee?”</p>
<p>Aunt Joy rubbed the back of her neck and groaned. “Coffee would be wonderful.”</p>
<p>Lucy made coffee and toast. Aunt Joy drank two cups of coffee before she had any food. By that time Buffy had come back downstairs, her hair damp and traces of yesterday’s makeup around her eyes. For a few minutes the three of them picked at their food in silence. Then Aunt Joy asked Buffy where she’d been all night. Lucy didn’t expect the violent red blush that flared in Buffy’s cheeks.</p>
<p>Buffy stuttered wordlessly. “I...uh...”</p>
<p>“Buffy,” Aunt Joy said, her voice full of warning, “where were you?”</p>
<p>Lucy looked from Buffy’s blushing face to Aunt Joy’s pinched lips. Then a flash of silver caught her eye. Buffy was twisting a silver ring around her finger, one that looked exactly like a ring Lucy had seen before, last night, in fact.</p>
<p>“Oh,” Lucy said. She checked the clock and stood up. “We have to go now if we’re walking.”</p>
<p>“I’ll drive you,” Aunt Joy said immediately. Then she yawned.</p>
<p>“We’re walking.” Buffy jumped out of her seat and crammed her last bite of toast into her mouth. “Come on, Lucy.”</p>
<p>“Don’t you want to do your makeup?” Lucy called after Buffy as she practically ran out the door.</p>
<p>The door shut behind Buffy. Lucy shook her head, feeling oddly bewildered. Buffy Summers, she of the perfect hair and makeup (when not fighting something slimy), had run out of the house looking like...that. She must really have not wanted to talk about what she’d done last night. Lucy didn’t blame her. Buffy had stayed the night at Angel’s and it had been her birthday and Angel had given her a ring that was tantamount to an engagement ring.</p>
<p>And now Angel was Angelus. Poor Buffy.</p>
<p>Lucy caught up with Buffy in the library five minutes before the bell for first period. Willow and Xander were there too, both of them looking shell-shocked. Lucy assumed that Mr. Giles had brought them up to date on Angelus. Buffy was yelling at Ms. Calendar. It took a few seconds for Lucy to figure out why and then she got angry too.</p>
<p>“Wait, you <em>knew </em>Angel could lose his soul?” Lucy demanded. “Why didn’t you say something so that, I don’t know, it didn’t happen?”</p>
<p>Ms. Calendar stammered an excuse that Mr. Giles cut off.</p>
<p>“All of you get to class!” Mr. Giles glared through his glasses like he was about to start shooting lasers from his eyes. “We’ll talk about this after school.”</p>
<p>The four students and one teacher scattered. Lucy and Willow reconvened at lunch to drag Buffy into a janitor’s closet and get the whole story out of her.</p>
<p>“You had sex with Angel?” Lucy asked as soon as they’d made sure that no one else was there and locked the door behind them.</p>
<p>At the same time, Willow asked “Angelus is back?” before doing a double-take. “Wait, you had sex with Angel? Why didn’t you tell me? Isn’t this best friend giggling over the phone talking stuff?”</p>
<p>“Not the time, Willow.” Lucy turned back to Buffy. “Yes or no?”</p>
<p>Buffy’s cheeks turned pink. “Yes.”</p>
<p>“And Angel lost his soul how?”</p>
<p>“Ms. Calendar,” Buffy scowled briefly, “called it a ‘moment of perfect happiness’.”</p>
<p>Lucy grimaced. She was doing the math and she did not like the answer she was finding.</p>
<p>“Oh!” Willow said. She blushed. “Oh. When you and Angel...and then with the soul...poof.”</p>
<p>That wasn’t how Lucy would have summarized it, but it sounded like what she was thinking. Buffy and Angel slept together, Angel had his “moment of perfect happiness” and then his soul was gone and the demon was back in full control.</p>
<p>Buffy blinked and a single tear ran down her cheek. “This is my fault.”</p>
<p>Lucy and Willow both instantly proclaimed that it was not her fault. Buffy wasn’t convinced.</p>
<p>“Look,” Lucy said, “I’m guessing that Angel being Angel he said that whenever you wanted to stop for whatever reason you would stop, he wouldn’t push you. Right?”</p>
<p>Buffy nodded.</p>
<p>“So neither of you did anything you didn’t want to do. You didn’t know that this would happen. It’s not your fault or Angel’s fault.” Lucy clenched her jaw. “If it’s anyone’s fault, it’s Ms. Calendar’s for not telling anyone that it was possible for Angel to lose his soul.”</p>
<p>“Yeah,” Willow said. “You didn’t know so no fault can be assigned.”</p>
<p>Buffy still didn’t seem sure. She chewed on her bottom lip, quickly breaking through the skin and drawing blood.</p>
<p>Willow put a hand on Buffy’s shoulder. “This is not your fault,” she said firmly. She was wearing what she referred to as her resolve face. “We are going to fix this.”</p>
<p>Lucy hoped that she was right.</p>
  </div></div>
<a name="section0019"><h2>19. Phases</h2></a>
<div class="story"><div class="userstuff module">
    
    <p>
  <strong>
    <em>Buffy</em>
  </strong>
</p>
<p>Ms. Calendar tried to buy forgiveness for not telling them that she was a member of the clan that had cursed Angel with a soul who had been sent to keep tabs on him and make sure he suffered with a vampire uninviting spell. Buffy was still mad at her, but the uninvite spell did make everyone feel safer, especially after Willow’s fish were killed.</p>
<p>Giles was worried about dead fish being the only sign they had seen of Angelus for more than two days. Two days. It was like he expected half the town to wake up dead.</p>
<p>Somehow Buffy had managed to avoid the super awkward sex talk with Mom. That may have been because they were all busy running around doing research and damage control for Angelus being back, but Buffy was happy to have that conversation put off for as long as possible. It was too embarrassing to even think about.</p>
<p>Buffy twirled the stake in her hand and looked down at the fresh grave she was waiting for a shiny new vampire to rise from. See, that was the bad thing about gravesitting, it gave her too much time to think. If she had to wait much longer she’d be listing reasons for why Angelus being on the loose was her fault again, and Lucy had promised that if she kept doing that she’d...well, she hadn’t made a specific threat but she had said that Buffy would regret it.</p>
<p>The soil of the grave shifted. Buffy got into a fighting stance as a hand broke through. The hand clawed at the ground and the vampire it belonged to pulled itself halfway out of its grave. The vampire growled when it saw Buffy.</p>
<p>“You Buffy?” it asked.</p>
<p>“Last time I checked,” Buffy replied. She didn’t have a clear shot at the vampire’s heart yet. How much longer was it going to take to dig itself out?</p>
<p>The vampire pulled its other arm free of the grave. “Angelus has a message for you.”</p>
<p>Buffy froze. Faster than she would have expected for a baby vampire, the vampire hauled itself fully out of its grave and lunged at her. The vampire had been a short-haired woman who had been buried in a white dress that was now nearly black with dirt. Buffy dodged her first clumsy attack. The vampire growled.</p>
<p>“You know what they say about not killing the messenger?” Buffy said. She dodged a punch, stepped inside the vampire’s guard and drove her stake into the vampire’s heart. “Does it still apply if you’re already dead?”</p>
<p>The vampire burst into a cloud of ashes with a shriek. Buffy dusted flakes of the vampireized corpse of Mary Brandon out of her hair. She hoped that the girl’s family didn’t change their mind and want to have her cremated.</p>
<p>Angelus had killed that girl. He’d given her a message and sired her, knowing that Buffy and her friends were the only people in town hunting vampires. For a second Buffy wished that she’d let the vampire keep talking. That message could have been important. Giles would definitely be mad at her for missing it.</p>
<p>After a moment, Buffy shrugged and walked away from the pile of ashes that was slowly being blown away by the wind. Angelus probably just wanted to taunt her. According to Giles that was a big part of his MO along with killing puppies.</p>
<p>She reported the messenger to Giles the next morning. As expected, Giles wasn’t happy. He had his glasses in his hand before she even finished talking.</p>
<p>“You couldn’t have waited to get what may have been important information before slaying her?” Giles grumbled and put his thoroughly cleaned glasses back on.</p>
<p>“Key words: may have,” Buffy said. “It was probably ‘I’m going to kill you, grr, argh’ or something like that.”</p>
<p>Giles sighed. “Unfortunately, we will never know.”</p>
<p>The library doors swung open. Ms. Calendar and a long-faced man wearing a suit that looked like it belonged to a sheriff in an old Western walked in. The man was scowling, which made his face look even longer.</p>
<p>“Ms. Calendar,” Giles said, even more stiffly than with his usual Britishness.</p>
<p>“Mr. Giles.” Ms. Calendar nodded towards the sheriff suit man. “This is my uncle Enyos. He can help us with defeating Angelus. He knows a lot more about Angel’s curse than I do.”</p>
<p>“Moment of perfect happiness, soul goes poof.” Buffy crossed her arms. “How much more is there?”</p>
<p>Enyos sputtered. “That curse was a very powerful, very complicated piece of magic, young lady!”</p>
<p>Buffy shrugged and turned to Giles. “Do we need them?”</p>
<p>Giles looked like he’d bitten into a lemon. “More sources would be...helpful.”</p>
<p>Oh phooey. Buffy was hoping that he’d say they’d be fine on their own.</p>
<p>Enyos looked even more annoyed than Giles. He turned to Ms. Calendar and said something harsh in a language that Buffy didn’t know. Ms. Calendar responded in the same language. Giles took off his glasses and began cleaning them.</p>
<p>Buffy bolted from the library when the bell rang, leaving the three adults standing in an awkward circle. She almost expected to see them still standing there when she and Willow went back at lunch. Instead, Giles and Enyos were sitting at the table with several piles of books and Ms. Calendar was nowhere to be seen, probably because she was in her classroom.</p>
<p>“Anything new, Giles?” Willow asked.</p>
<p>Giles looked up from the multiple books open in front of him. He blinked at Buffy and Willow. He seemed surprised to see them. “Ah, not very much I’m afraid. How long have you two been standing there?”</p>
<p>“Just got here.” Buffy walked over to the table and looked over Giles’s shoulder. “That’s not Latin.”</p>
<p>“No it is not.” Giles added something about cherries to the notes he was taking. “Detailed sources on Angelus and the Kalderash tend to be written in Vlax Romani. Enyos is of course much better at translating them then I am.”</p>
<p>Enyos didn’t respond to Giles’s inclusion of him in the conversation. His eyes were fixed on the one book, scroll actually, on the table in front of him.</p>
<p>Willow walked over to the other side of the table and picked up one of the unopened books. “Are all of these about Angel’s curse?”</p>
<p>Giles shook his head. “Most are about Angelus or the Scourge of Europe in general. I’ve been looking to see if I can find any other patterns Angelus may have had.”</p>
<p>“I can do that,” Willow said. “That way you can focus on the Romani stuff that the rest of us can’t read.”</p>
<p>“That would be very helpful, Willow. Thank you.” Giles looked back down at his books. “Don’t stay here too late; you need to get home before sunset.”</p>
<p>“It’s lunchtime, Giles, not after school,” Buffy said.</p>
<p>Giles blinked and turned to the clock. “So it is. Perhaps we might break for lunch?”</p>
<p>The question was for Enyos, who grumbled in response. Talkative guy, wasn’t he?</p>
<p>Willow was already working on the non-curse related books. Buffy thought about trying to get her to stop but decided that it would be easier to just make sure that Willow and Giles ate. Enyos was taking bites of a granola bar that he’d taken out of his jacket, so Buffy didn’t have to worry about him.</p>
<p>That was pretty much how the rest of the week went. Patrol, then school, then research (usually done by Giles, Willow and Enyos). Sometimes Lucy would help Willow, who was making a timeline of all Angelus’s recorded actions, but once they started finding stuff from the 1860s onward Lucy gave up on that research. Buffy thought that her reason was probably the same as why Buffy had refused to do any Angelus research in the first place.</p>
<p>Of course, Xander was glad to help Willow with her timeline.</p>
<p>Mom stole Buffy and Lucy from the semi-permanent research party on Saturday. She said that they needed a break and took them to the mall for a Mom-sponsored shopping trip. They didn’t actually end up buying anything, just spent the whole morning modelling outfits, admiring jewellery and trying out perfumes. It was a lot of fun. And if Buffy found herself judging necklaces by if they could be used as garrotes and outfits by how well someone could fight in them, well, that was her business. </p>
<p>Willow called Buffy on Saturday afternoon. She’d been babbling for more than a minute before Buffy had any idea what she was talking about.</p>
<p>“Xander and Cordelia were kissing a janitor?”</p>
<p>“What? No! They were kissing each other! Lips were touching and hands were...stuff!” There was a crash that sounded like Willow dropping the phone. She spoke again after a few seconds, sounding as frantic as she was before the crash. “I wanted to hide because Giles and Ms. Calendar were talking and I didn’t want to interrupt so I went into a janitor’s closet and Xander and Cordelia were there, kissing! With lips and hands and noises that were really uncomfortable to be in close quarters with!”</p>
<p>Buffy covered the mouthpiece of the phone with her hand. “Lucy?”</p>
<p>Lucy stuck her head into Buffy’s room. She was holding one hand behind her back. “Yeah?”</p>
<p>“Did you know that Xander and Cordelia were making with the smoochies?”</p>
<p>“Well, yeah.” Lucy wrinkled her nose. “Wasn’t it obvious?”</p>
<p>Buffy raised her eyebrows. “Not really, no.” At least, not to people who couldn’t read minds.</p>
<p>Lucy shrugged and turned around to go back to her own room, giving Buffy a good view of the one-handed battle axe she was carrying. She was gone before Buffy could ask what that was about.</p>
<p>Willow was still babbling. Buffy knew better than to wait for her to pause to breathe, so she spoke over her in the microscopic pause between Willow’s words. “Willow! You’re over Xander, right?”</p>
<p>Willow stopped in the middle of a sentence. “Well, yeah. I’m not jealous. But Xander has hated Cordelia since forever. It’s majorly weird.”</p>
<p>Buffy thought that it was weird too. Total wigfest. One of them had to be the rational one though, and it wasn’t going to be Willow.</p>
<p>It took almost an hour for her to get Willow to calm down. As she hung up the phone the thought that this was stuff normal teenagers talked about crossed her mind. <em>That </em>was really weird. Buffy couldn’t remember the last time she’d talked with Willow without mentioning anything Hellmouthy. Well, they had mentioned that Cordelia wasn’t evil but that was something a normal teenager would say and there hadn’t been one word about demons.</p>
<hr/>
<p>It was Sunday night when Enyos was killed. He’d been staying in a real hotel, not one of the sleazy motels that were basically vampire buffets. Giles found him. He’d gone to the hotel when Enyos didn’t show up at the library on Monday morning. Buffy’s mom called the school to get her out of class so that she could inspect the scene with Giles before they called the police. Mom probably wasn’t happy about excusing Buffy to go see a body, but she’d still done it. She was definitely getting used to the Slayer thing.</p>
<p>Enyos body was seated on the chair at the desk in his room. He had been posed with a pen in his hand and a blood soaked piece of paper in front of him. Aside from the paper, the desk was empty. There was more blood on the wall above the desk. It had been used to write a message:</p>
<p>WAS IT GOOD FOR YOU TOO?</p>
<p>“Angelus did this.” Buffy was absolutely certain of that.</p>
<p>“Enyos’s books have been taken.” Giles kept reaching up to his glasses like he wanted to take them off and start cleaning them. “His notes are also gone.”</p>
<p>Angelus and anyone else he might have brought with him had to have taken them. Buffy asked Giles if that was all of their research.</p>
<p>“Not all of it, no. I kept most of it in my home and Willow has her own notes as well. However, Enyos had the majority of our research on the ensoulment curse.” Giles rubbed his forehead and got up from looking under the bed. “Look for anything that may have been left behind.”</p>
<p>Buffy looked. She found nothing. The thieves had been thorough. Every scrap of paper was gone except for the one purposefully left on the desk.</p>
<p>“Blast.” Giles gave in and took off his glasses. He wiped each lens once before putting them back on. “We had best inform the authorities. Perhaps they will find something we missed.”</p>
<p>Buffy snorted. That was possible but very, very unlikely. Sunnydale cops weren’t the brightest bunch when it came to murder investigations.</p>
<p>They got back to school at the start of lunch. Willow, Xander, Oz, Cordelia and Lucy were waiting in the library. Giles greeted them before leaving to look for Ms. Calendar.</p>
<p>“What happened?” Willow asked. She was very carefully not looking at Cordelia even though Cordelia was sitting across the table from her.</p>
<p>Buffy sat down next to Willow. “Enyos is dead. We think Angelus did it.”</p>
<p>“Isn’t that the guy who was doing pretty much all your research?” Cordelia asked.</p>
<p>Xander crossed his arms. “Not all our research. Just the most important research.”</p>
<p>Cordelia collapsed against the back of her chair. “Fantastic.”</p>
<p>“All of Enyos’s notes are gone too.” Buffy looked over at Lucy. “Is Drusilla happy or something?”</p>
<p>Lucy scowled down at the table. “Drusilla is asleep. I’d like her to stay like that because, you know, it’s nice to be alone in my own head.”</p>
<p>“What are you talking about?” Cordelia asked. “Wait. Are you like a seer or something? I totally missed that memo.”</p>
<p>Xander and Willow, mostly Willow, explained the whole Drusilla psychic link thing to Cordelia. While they were doing that, Buffy tried to think of ways they could get Enyos’s books and notes back. All of her plans seemed to boil down to storming the factory and taking them back by force, which she knew wouldn’t work. She was the only one who could fight Angelus head on and she...didn’t want to. The thought made her feel all oogy inside. Going into a fight like that would get her dead, and she really liked not being dead.</p>
<p>“Are we going to actually do something?” Lucy asked. “How much did we lose?”</p>
<p>Buffy repeated what Giles had said about Enyos’s research. Lucy swore under her breath.</p>
<p>“So you guys can’t get Angel’s soul back,” Cordelia said. “What’s plan B?”</p>
<p>Xander shrugged. “Dead Boy dies. Again.”</p>
<p>Buffy and Willow immediately rejected that plan. Loudly. With emphases.</p>
<p>Xander shrank back with his hands held up in surrender. “Okay, okay. Is there any good news we can work with?”</p>
<p>“Good news!” Giles said as he walked into the library. “Ms. Calendar says that Enyos most likely destroyed his notes before they could be taken.”</p>
<p>Willow sat straight up. “Oh! So, at best, they only have his books, which they’re not going to be able to read.”</p>
<p>They had a moment to process that before Lucy burst their bubble. “Dalton will be able to read them. He’s good at that stuff. I don’t think he knows the language, so it’ll take maybe a month.”</p>
<p>That meant that they had a month to come up with a plan. They could do that, Buffy knew they could. They’d done more with less.</p>
<p>They kept researching. Buffy kept training. She imagined what it would be like to kill Angelus, to drive a stake through his heart and watch him turn to dust. She dreamed about killing him and woke up crying. She couldn’t go back to sleep after that.</p>
<hr/>
<p>Xander and Cordelia came into the library while Buffy was training on Tuesday morning in a panic. They were talking over each other, but Buffy was able to piece together something about being attacked by a demon that looked like Bigfoot. That was weird because, from what she’d heard Lucy talking about with Mom, Bigfoot was the definition of a gentle giant. Also, Bigfoots (Bigfeet?) lived a lot further north.</p>
<p>“It sounds as if you may have encountered a werewolf,” Giles said in a very musing way once Xander and Cordelia had finished talking.</p>
<p>Xander gestured with both hands, pointing at Giles. “This was not an encounter. This was a very frightening attack.”</p>
<p>Cordelia frowned. “Why would a guy who turns into a dog once a month want to attack us? I mean, me I understand, guys always go for me, but Xander’s so nonthreatening.”</p>
<p>“Like I didn’t get told that enough,” Xander muttered.</p>
<p>Giles took off the pads and helmet he’d been wearing to help Buffy train and went to his books. “Where exactly did this attack occur?”</p>
<p>Xander coughed.</p>
<p>“What was that?” Giles asked.</p>
<p>“Lovers’ Lane,” Cordelia said. “You know, in the woods up on that cliff. You can see the whole town from there.”</p>
<p>Giles picked out a book and leafed through it. The three of them stood and watched.</p>
<p>“That would be congruent with a werewolf,” Giles said slowly. “There were an unusual number of animals killed last night.”</p>
<p>“But no one was hurt?” That wasn’t really a question. Buffy knew that if there had been any odd human deaths or dismemberments then Giles would have already told her.</p>
<p>“So we’ve got a wolf boy running around.” Xander clapped his hands together. “We can’t kill him, can we? I mean, he’s human twenty-nine days out of thirty.”</p>
<p>“Twenty-seven days out of thirty,” Giles corrected. “A werewolf changes form the nights before and after the full moon as well as during the full moon. We will have to identify him and contain him for the next two nights.”</p>
<p>“Or her.” Buffy shrugged when the others looked at her. “Could be a wolf girl.”</p>
<p>“Yes. Quite.” Giles frowned. “They could conceivably be any person in Sunnydale.”</p>
<p>Well, they could rule out all the vampires and other demons. Cordelia and Xander were out too. Buffy was pretty sure she hadn’t been running around all furry. When they asked, Giles said that he had been at home all night and nothing in his house was destroyed, so it couldn’t be him. That left about thirty thousand possible werewolves.</p>
<p>The bell for first period rang. Giles told them to come back at lunch with all the others, including the Dingoes. Buffy and Xander ran to their first class. Cordelia didn’t run because she could get away with being fashionably late. Buffy wanted to hate her for that, she really did, but Cordila was dating Xander now and hating her for being the queen bee seemed petty. It sucked.</p>
<p>They crowded into the library at lunch. After filling Willow and the Dingoes in on the werewolf situation, Giles asked for ideas.</p>
<p> “Set a trap,” Sam, not the drummer, the other guy who wasn’t Oz or Devon, suggested.</p>
<p>“With what?” Devon asked. Sam shrugged.</p>
<p>Buffy thought that a trap wasn’t a bad idea, but Devon was right. Even Giles didn’t know what they’d bait it with. Meat? Live goats? Virgins? That stuff was all over Sunnydale, no way they’d get one werewolf to come to them when it had the whole town to eat.</p>
<p>Lucy began to pace next to the checkout counter. She was silent but when she turned around Buffy could see that she was frowning, deep in thought.</p>
<p>“We could stake out Lovers’ Lane,” Buffy said. “And the Bronze and any other places where the werewolf might show up.”</p>
<p>“But we don’t have any weapons that won’t, you know, kill,” Willow said. “How are we going to capture a werewolf without any of us getting bitten or scratched and turned into werewolves?”</p>
<p>“Oh!” Xander held up his hand. “I’m having an idea. Tranq guns. We knock the wolf person out from a distance.”</p>
<p>Everyone thought that sounded like a good idea. The only problem would be getting tranquilizer guns.</p>
<p>“I can get some for us,” Xander said. “But don’t ask where I got them.”</p>
<p>They were probably going to be stolen. Hopefully Xander wouldn’t get caught. Buffy wasn’t sure about their abilities to break him out of jail.</p>
<p>Buffy caught up with Lucy after the meeting broke up. “Hey, what were you thinking about so hard back there?”</p>
<p>Lucy looked around and leaned closer to Buffy. “I thought that I might be able to figure out who the werewolf is from their thoughts, but I can’t figure out how to do that without...losing myself.”</p>
<p>“Oh,” Buffy said. “Well, it’s good that you thought about it, right? I mean, if you could have helped then that would have been good.”</p>
<p>“I guess so.” Lucy got a distant look in her eyes. “But I don’t feel much like jumping off of a building.”</p>
<p>Lucy walked away before Buffy could ask her what the hell she was talking about. Buffy watched her disappear into the crowd before shaking her head and going off to her next class. Werewolf first, then heart-to-hearts about people dying. At least, Buffy hoped it was other people that Lucy was talking about. It had to be other people with such an oddly specific example.</p>
<p>Buffy knew that she was still off balance when she totally missed Willow’s warning and slammed Larry to the floor during self-defence in gym class. She flipped him over her shoulder and Larry got the wind knocked out of him. If there hadn’t been mats on the floor she’d have given him a concussion.</p>
<p>“Oops,” Buffy said.</p>
<p>“You okay, Larry?” their teacher, who was also the football coach, asked.</p>
<p>Larry struggled to breathe, but he gave Coach Hass a thumbs-up. Then, once he was able to get to his feet, he practically roared at Buffy before stomping to the other side of the gym.</p>
<p>Xander walked over to Buffy. “So, I heard Larry talking earlier,” he said in a low voice. “Guess who got bitten by a ‘dog’ last week? I’m liking Larry for our wolf boy.”</p>
<p>Buffy looked over at Larry, who was flirting aggressively with another girl in the class. “Talk to him. See what you can find out.”</p>
<p>“Aye, aye captain.” Xander grinned.</p>
<p>They gathered in the library a few hours before sunset. Xander had gotten three dart guns and fifty tranquilizer darts. As promised, none of them asked where he’d gotten them.</p>
<p>“So, who gets the guns?” Devon asked. “We’re not all going out looking for a werewolf, right?”</p>
<p>“I’m not going.” Cordelia crossed her arms. “No way am I going to risk getting turned into a werewolf. That can’t be good for your job prospects.”</p>
<p>Soul raised his hand hesitantly. “If we’re opting out, I’m not much of a fighter.”</p>
<p>“Buffy and I can shoot,” Xander said. “How about you, G-man?”</p>
<p>Giles grimaced. “I must admit I’m not overly confident about my abilities, but I should be able to muddle through.”</p>
<p>“I can shoot,” Lucy said. The rest of them looked at her and she shrugged. “Halloween.”</p>
<p>Buffy thought for a moment. “Let’s do teams of two. Giles, you’re with me. Xander and Willow can work together and Lucy...”</p>
<p>“Lucy and I can team up,” Sam said. “I’ve done some martial arts so I won’t be too much of a weak link.”</p>
<p>“Okay.” Buffy looked at the people who wouldn’t be patrolling. “Soul, Devon, Oz, you guys okay to stay here?”</p>
<p>Giles cleared his throat. “Buffy, with Angelus at large...”</p>
<p>“We’ll hole up at home,” Devon said. “Call us if you need backup.”</p>
<p>Cordelia sighed. “And I guess I can be backup too. When did I become one of your Slayerettes?”</p>
<p>Buffy and Willow divided up the town for the three teams. Buffy and Giles got the woods and the rest of the area around Lovers’ Lane, where they already knew the werewolf had been. Lucy and Sam took downtown, near the Bronze and some other clubs that would attract the werewolf because of all the raging hormones. According to Giles there was a pretty good chance that the werewolf wouldn’t end up there because of all the demons that frequented the area, but they had to cover their bases. Lucy and Sam would probably spend most of the night staking vampires. Xander and Willow got the last chunk of town around the UC Sunnydale campus. Same deal with the hormones, plus a wooded area and fewer demons.</p>
<p>“We’ll meet back here after sunrise,” Giles said. “If anyone catches the werewolf, the book cage will be strong enough to hold them. I’ll leave the keys under the counter.”</p>
<p>Buffy and Giles got nothing from their trek through the woods but a run in with a werewolf hunter (Buffy knocked him unconscious and left him up a tree) and a whole lot of gossip about who was cheating on their boyfriend/girlfriend with who. Getting into a fight with a group of vampires on the way back to school made Buffy feel a little bit better about coming up empty, even if the vampires did make it easy by being drunk enough to stay out so close to sunrise.</p>
<p>When they got back to the library, Xander and Willow were already there watching the unconscious furry creature they had locked in the book cage. Xander was cradling his dart gun with Soldier Booth’s readiness.</p>
<p>“You got it?” Buffy exclaimed.</p>
<p> “Yup!” Willow grinned. “He was eating a deer in the woods near UCS.”</p>
<p>“‘He’?” Buffy asked. Willow blushed.</p>
<p>“Uh, yeah.” Xander was as red as Willow. “Definitely a he, probably not Larry.”</p>
<p>Buffy raised an eyebrow. “Why not Larry?”</p>
<p>More blood rushed to Xander’s cheeks. “I talked to him. Trust me on this one.”</p>
<p>Lucy and Sam came into the library. “Lots of vampires,” Sam said. “No werewolf. Oh, that’s the werewolf, isn’t it?”</p>
<p>Buffy and Willow nodded. “Yup.”</p>
<p>“He’s waking up,” Xander said. “I’m kind of impressed one dart lasted that long. Maybe I picked up the extra strength.”</p>
<p>Giles looked at the clock. “He should be reverting to his human form any minute now.”</p>
<p>Almost exactly a minute later, Buffy heard cracking sounds coming from the book cage. She winched. She knew exactly what those sounds came from. Their werewolf’s bones were breaking and shifting around. She guessed that that was how the transformation was physically able to happen. She hoped that the werewolf was still mostly unconscious. She wouldn’t want anyone to be awake through that.</p>
<p>The werewolf turned back into a human. A very naked human. Buffy quickly averted her eyes, but not before she caught a glimpse of short, purple hair.</p>
<p>“Oh,” Oz said. “This could be an issue.”</p>
<p>They got Oz clothes. Xander had some extras that he kept at the library for nights when the demon slaying got really messy. His shorts were a bit big on Oz, but Sam gave up one of the three belts he was wearing and Oz made it work.</p>
<p>“So,” Sam said once they were settled around the table, “you’re a werewolf, huh?”</p>
<p>Oz shrugged. “Seems so.”</p>
<p>“Huh.” Sam rubbed his chin thoughtfully. “That could be good for branding.”</p>
<p>“There’s a werewolf hunter in town,” Buffy said. “You need to keep your head down, Oz. He’s horrible.”</p>
<p>Giles explained what the werewolf hunter Cain had said about skinning werewolves alive. Everyone looked as sick as Buffy felt.</p>
<p>“Oz can come here tomorrow night,” Giles said. “A few of us can keep an eye on him and give him protection from Cain.”</p>
<p>Oz agreed and Willow and Xander volunteered to stay with him and Giles. Lucy asked what Cain looked like so the rest of them would know if they saw him. Buffy describe him, trying to picture him clearly in her head in case Lucy was doing her mind reading thing. Even if she wasn’t, the necklace of werewolf teeth would be a pretty big clue to who the guy was.</p>
<p>“So are you guys going to focus on those books that got stolen now?” Sam asked. “Since Oz is going to be here and not killing people.”</p>
<p>“We should.” Giles frowned. “Though I’m afraid we’ve come up against something of a wall.”</p>
<p>“We could look around the factory during the day,” Lucy said slowly. “But there’s no guarantee everyone will be asleep.” She yawned. “Speaking of, we have school today.”</p>
<p>“Yes, all of you should go home and sleep.” Giles took off his glasses and rubbed his eyes. “I will—”</p>
<p>Buffy interrupted him. “Also go home and get some sleep. We’ve talked about this Giles.”</p>
<p>Giles cracked a sheepish smile. “We have, haven’t we? Very well, we will reconvene at lunchtime. Go get some rest.”</p>
<p>Oz walked home with Buffy and Lucy. He was pensive. Neither of the girls spoke. Buffy didn’t want to interrupt him. They walked to Oz’s house first, Buffy and Lucy closing ranks around him without a word. Oz said goodnight, though night was long over, and went inside.</p>
<p>Buffy didn’t say anything until they were almost back at their house. “What you said earlier about jumping off a roof,” she started.</p>
<p>Lucy flinched like Buffy had hit her. “Could we talk about that when we’re not both about to pass out?”</p>
<p>Buffy knew deflection when she saw it, but she put an arm around Lucy and gave her a hug. “Sure.”</p>
<p>“Thanks.” Lucy smiled. “So, vampires, werewolves, mummies, witches. What’s next?”</p>
<p>Buffy shrugged. “I try not to think about it.” Sometimes that was the best way to survive the Hellmouth.</p>
  </div></div>
<a name="section0020"><h2>20. Bewitched, Bothered and Bewildered</h2></a>
<div class="story"><div class="userstuff module">
    
    <p>
  <strong>
    <em>Giles</em>
  </strong>
</p>
<p>The pink and red greeting card on his desk was taunting Giles. He’d been trying to write a message in it between books since yesterday but all he’d managed thus far was the salutation. He needed more than “Dear Jenny” to fill the empty space.</p>
<p>He pushed the card out of his line of vision and tried to concentrate on his book. It was one of the ones on Angelus that described the only other time he’d hunted a Slayer, an Irish girl named Niamh Belton, in 1834. It didn’t say what Niamh had done to catch Angelus’s attention, but it laid out in great detail everything that he’d done to torment her before he killed her. Even one hundred and sixty-four years later, Giles felt sympathy for the girl and was grateful on her behalf that she hadn’t had any family or close friends. The things that Angelus had done to the strangers she interacted with would surely have broken her completely if they’d happened to anyone she cared deeply about. Buffy was at a disadvantage in that way. She had people she loved and Angelus knew it.  </p>
<p>Giles took off his glasses and rubbed his forehead with one hand. He was tempted, very tempted, to pack everyone up and scatter them in safe houses across the known world. That would at least slow Angelus down. It could buy them a few years perhaps, but it would also leave the Hellmouth without a Slayer. None of them were that selfish.</p>
<p>He had warned everyone to stay inside at night for the next few days. Angelus was consistently more vicious than usual around Valentine’s Day.</p>
<p>There were footsteps on the floor outside. “Mr. Giles?” Lucy called from out in the library.</p>
<p>“Giles, you here?” Buffy asked.</p>
<p>Giles put his glasses back on and stepped out of his office. “I’m here. Is something wrong?”</p>
<p>“Actually, something’s finally going right.” Buffy looked at Lucy. “Someone got a very useful Valentine’s Day present.”</p>
<p>Giles raised an eyebrow. “Do explain.”</p>
<p>“Someone left Enyos’s books at our door last night,” Lucy said. “You and Ms. Calendar would have to check, but I think they’re all there.”</p>
<p>Giles felt his heart leap. “That’s wonderful news. Do you know who brought them?” Perhaps they had an ally, one who was able to go into the factory and come out alive. But it would do no good to get ahead of himself.</p>
<p>Buffy smirked. “Yup.”</p>
<p>“No, we don’t.” Lucy narrowed her eyes at Buffy from behind her back. “We have guesses.”</p>
<p>Buffy turned to face Lucy. “It was totally Spike.” She put her hands on her hips. Giles imagined that she was either still smirking or giving Lucy an arch look.</p>
<p>“Spike is in a wheelchair,” Lucy said. She sounded tired, like they’d already had this argument before. “He couldn’t have brought the books to us.”</p>
<p>“But you know it was his idea,” Buffy wheedled. “Come on, who else could it be, Drusilla?”</p>
<p>Lucy sighed. “Maybe it was. I don’t know. This could all be a game to her. Let it go, Buffy. Let it go.”</p>
<p>Giles cleared his throat. “Well, however you received them, we have the books now. Can I assume that you left them at home?”</p>
<p>The girls turned back to him and nodded. “Yup,” Buffy said. “Safe and sound behind our anti-vamp threshold.”</p>
<p>“Good,” Giles said. The books wouldn’t be able to be stolen again by any vampires.</p>
<p>Giles arranged to go to the Summers’ house after school to collect the books and then Buffy and Lucy left to get ready for class. Giles had only been back at his desk for a few moments when he heard screams coming from outside the library. He ran out to the hallway and turned around until he saw a cluster of students backing away from something on the floor.</p>
<p>“That’s Theresa!” a girl shouted as Giles made his way towards the students. He got there a few seconds before Buffy, Lucy and Willow. All of them stared at the brown-haired girl sprawled on the floor. Lucy crouched down and checked for a pulse. She looked up and shook her head.</p>
<p>“What happened?” Giles demanded of the other five students gathered around the dead girl.</p>
<p>“She...she was in my locker,” a boy said. “I opened it and she...fell.”</p>
<p>The girl who’d recognized Theresa started crying. “Oh my god, oh my god!” The other girl who was there patted her on the back, still staring at the body.</p>
<p>“Mr. Giles?” Lucy said softly. She moved Theresa’s hair to the side and exposed the vampire bite on the girl’s neck.</p>
<p>“Oh dear.” Giles said. “Lucy, please stop touching the body and go inform Principal Snyder of what’s happened.”</p>
<p>Lucy grimaced. Giles certainly understood why as he wouldn’t wish talking to Snyder on anyone.</p>
<p>“Break it to him slowly perhaps,” Giles suggested. “A bit of delay won’t hurt.”</p>
<p> Lucy nodded. She stood and hurried in the direction of the principal’s office without a word of complaint. Giles trusted that she would delay Snyder long enough for them to get a closer look at Theresa’s body, at least long enough for them to check if she would be coming back as a vampire. He crouched down to do so and saw that there wasn’t any blood on Theresa’s lips, which was a good sign. However, he didn’t dare open her mouth to check for blood inside with so many witnesses. It looked like Buffy would be paying a visit to the morgue tonight to be on safe side.</p>
<p>One of the other boys tapped on Buffy’s shoulder. “Hey, you’re Buffy Summers, right?”</p>
<p>“Yeah,” Buffy said. “Why?”</p>
<p>The boy handed her something pink that Giles couldn’t quite make out, obscured as it was by the boy’s and Buffy’s hands. “That fell out of Charlie’s locker too. It’s got your name on it so...” The boy shrugged. His eyes flickered towards Theresa. “You didn’t kill her, right?”</p>
<p>“What?” Buffy exclaimed. “Of course I didn’t kill her!”</p>
<p>“I didn’t think you did,” the boy said. “But...it’s got your name on it.”</p>
<p>Buffy muttered something too quietly for Giles to hear. The boy nodded and went back to stand with Charlie.</p>
<p>Giles made his way around Theresa’s body to Buffy and Willow. The thing that the boy had given Buffy turned out to be a pink paper envelope with her name written neatly across the front in black ink. Buffy turned it over in her hands, frowning at it.</p>
<p>“You shouldn’t open it,” Willow said. “It’s evidence. But...the police probably won’t know what to do with it and you should probably know what’s in it. You should open it.”</p>
<p>“Of course she’s not going to open it.” Giles said, with some volume. He looked at Buffy and spoke in a low voice. “Open it before Snyder gets here.”</p>
<p>Buffy tore open the envelope and took out a pink card with a bundle of roses on the front, the exact card that was waiting on Giles’s desk. She read what was written in the card and her face grew pale. Her lips formed a tight, thin line and she handed the card to Giles.</p>
<p>Giles read the message inside the card. Then he grimaced. His eyes traced over the words again.</p>
<p>“<em>Dear Buffy,</em>” the card read. “<em>Happy Valentine’s Day. I hope you like your present. Love from, your Angel.</em>”</p>
<p>“Theresa was a good person,” Buffy said. “She didn’t deserve this.”</p>
<p>Giles looked at Buffy. She was shaking, her hands clenched into fists. Anger was, Giles thought, the best reaction she could have to this, though perhaps not right at this moment when Principal Snyder was stalking down the hallway towards them. Giles quickly tucked the card into his jacket and prepared to prevent Buffy from attacking the horrible man.</p>
<p>Snyder sent all of them away after only a few digs and threats towards Buffy, Giles and Lucy. The girls went to class, because of course classes at Sunnydale High wouldn’t be cancelled for something so mundane as a dead girl stuffed in a locker, and Giles went back to the library. He took one look at the card on his desk and threw it in the rubbish. He would get a different one for Jenny, or perhaps he would get her some chocolates instead.</p>
<p>The police were long gone by the time school let out. Giles drove Buffy and Lucy home and picked up the books that had been delivered to them. He dove straight into the first translation and didn’t come up for air until well past midnight. When he saw the time he had a quick bite to eat and then went to bed. He had to be at work early to cross-reference some of the things he’d translated with the basic magic books he kept at the library.</p>
<hr/>
<p>The library was quiet all morning. Too quiet. Giles should have known that his peaceful workspace would be destroyed sooner than later. Really, it was obvious.</p>
<p>Xander came crashing through the library’s doors. “Giles! Help!”</p>
<p>Giles looked up from his notes. “Xander? What on earth are you so worked up about?”</p>
<p>“Girls! Love spell! Won’t leave me alone!” Xander took several deep breaths before he was able to speak in full sentences. “I got Amy to do a love spell for me and now all the girls at school are chasing after me.”</p>
<p>Giles shot out of his seat. “Are you mad? Love spells are dangerous, Xander! People have died because of them!” A love spell! This was the last thing they needed.</p>
<p>“I’m getting the dangerous part,” Xander squeaked. “What do I <em>do</em>?”</p>
<p>The glare that Giles shot at Xander made the boy flinch and take a step back. “<em>You </em>will do nothing. You will stay safely in the library while I find Amy and get her to reverse the spell. Is that clear?”</p>
<p>Xander nodded frantically. “Yes, sir!”</p>
<p>The hallways were eerily silent. School wasn’t over yet. There still should have been students and teachers milling about on their way to class, but Giles seemed to be the only one there. He looked into a nearby classroom. It was empty. He checked the next room. Also empty. Giles frowned. Where was everyone?</p>
<p>“I do hope they haven’t murdered each other,” he muttered as he walked down the hall. He didn’t think Xander’s love spell would escalate that quickly but then again he didn’t know when it had been cast.</p>
<p>Giles turned the corner and immediately had to stifle a yelp. A large group of girls were standing silently in the entryway, looking around at each other with clear suspicion.</p>
<p>One of the girls, a petite brunette who was even shorter than Buffy, noticed Giles and stepped towards him. “Have you seen Xander?”</p>
<p>“I believe he went home for the day,” Giles said.</p>
<p>“Oh.” The girl tilted her head. “Thanks.” She turned around and headed out the door, following the girls who had already begun to move as soon as Giles finished telling his lie.</p>
<p>The atrium emptied rapidly. It was only by luck that Amy Madison was far enough away from the doors that Giles could rush after her and stop her from leaving without any of the other girls noticing.</p>
<p>“Hey!” Amy tried to push past Giles. She was clearly under the spell that she had cast. That would make things tricky.</p>
<p>Giles spoke quickly. “Xander needs your help, Amy. We need to undo the spell that you did for him.”</p>
<p>Amy frowned. “Are you sure that’s what Xander wants? I won’t do anything that will hurt him. I love him.”</p>
<p>“Yes, Amy.” Giles lowered his voice, though he didn’t think there was anyone around to overhear him. “Why don’t I take you to him and he can tell you himself?”</p>
<p>A smile split Amy’s face. “Okay!”</p>
<p>They entered the library to a scene that Giles fervently hoped he was hallucinating. When Amy began shouting and marched towards the stairs leading to the stacks he had to accept that what he was seeing was real and quickly go after Amy before there could be bloodshed.</p>
<p>Buffy climbed off of Xander, who was lying on the stairs propped up by his elbows with a look on his face that made it clear that he was not okay with what had been happening, and straightened the very...skimpy blue raincoat that she was wearing. “Can it, witch-girl. Xander is mine. You can leave now.”</p>
<p>Amy put her hands on her hips. “I did the most powerful spell I’ve ever done for him. What have you ever done to show how much you love him, aside from the stripper impersonation?”</p>
<p>“Excuse me?” Buffy’s face went red.</p>
<p>“Buffy! Amy!” Xander jumped up and tried to separate the two girls. “No need to fight over the Xan Man. There’s plenty of me to not go around because neither of you actually love me romantically and we’re all friends here.”</p>
<p>“I love you!” Buffy and Amy both said. They glared at each other.</p>
<p>Xander looked at Giles with wide eyes. “Help!”</p>
<p>“Amy, why don’t we work on that spell?” Giles said.</p>
<p>“Yeah, Amy, go play witches and wizards with Giles and me and Xander can get back to what we were doing.” Buffy smiled at Xander.</p>
<p>Amy’s eyes flashed. She raised her hands palms out in front of her. “<em>Goddess </em><em>Hecate</em><em>, work thy will. Before thee let the unclean thing crawl.</em>”</p>
<p>Oh blast. That wasn’t good.</p>
<p>Light swirled around Amy in a vortex of power. It shot out and hit Buffy, who seemed to vanish. When the light disappeared, Buffy’s raincoat lay crumpled up on the floor. A little rodent nose poked out of one sleeve and the rat that was Buffy looked up at them.</p>
<p>Giles stared at Amy. “Where on earth did you learn animal transformation?”</p>
<p>Amy shrugged nonchalantly. She stepped closer to Xander and took his arm. “Why don’t we go somewhere more private?”</p>
<p>Xander shook her off. “I’m not going anywhere until you change Buffy back!”</p>
<p>“Buffy can take care of herself.” Amy tried to grab Xander’s arm again but he evaded her. His foot hit the floor right next to Buffy’s coat and the noise sent the rat running across the room.</p>
<p>“You turned her into a rat! Buffy-Buffy can take care of herself. Rat-Buffy is not Buffy-Buffy!” Xander looked at Giles. “What do we do?”</p>
<p>Giles sighed and took off his jacket. “Catch, uh, Rat-Buffy.” He looked at Amy. “You sit down and don’t move.”</p>
<p>Thankfully, Amy listened to Giles and took a seat at the table. Giles and Xander crept around the room looking for Rat-Buffy. Giles was by the circulation desk when he heard a crash. He jumped and spun around in time to see Rat-Buffy scampering out the library doors. Oz was standing over Xander, rubbing his hand.</p>
<p>“That kinda hurt,” Oz said.</p>
<p>“‘Kinda’?” Xander exclaimed. “What was that for?”</p>
<p>Giles interrupted Oz before he could get a full word out. “Never mind that! Buffy’s escaped the library. If anything happens to her...” He shook his head. He didn’t want to think about that.</p>
<p>“I was on the phone all night, listening to Willow cry about <em>you</em>.” Oz looked at Xander and held out a hand to help him up. “I don’t know what happened, but I was left with a very strong urge to hit you.”</p>
<p>“Nothing happened,” Xander said. “Cross my heart.”</p>
<p>Oz nodded.</p>
<p>“Boys!” Giles exclaimed. “We need to find Buffy.”</p>
<p>“Amy turned her into a rat,” Xander said when Oz looked at them with confusion.</p>
<p>Oz blinked. “Oh.”</p>
<p>Giles shook his head. Before he could bark out orders the doors swung open again. The blur that entered had Xander on the floor on the other side of the library in seconds. Xander gurgled, which was a logical response considering that Lucy was kneeling on top of him with her hands around his throat. Amy shrieked and jumped to her feet.</p>
<p>Oz pulled Lucy off of Xander. She screamed and fought him. Giles shook off his shock and went to help Oz hold Lucy back. The love spell should not have escalated <em>this </em>quickly.</p>
<p>“Let me go!” Lucy tried to twist her arms out of Giles’s grip. “Let me kill him! They won’t shut up! Let me kill him!”</p>
<p>“<em>Goddess Hecate, work thy will,</em>” Amy said. Xander stopped her by slapping her hands down.</p>
<p>“Would you quit it with the Hecate thing?!” Xander’s voice cracked and he rubbed his poor throat.</p>
<p>Lucy shook her head violently. “Shut up, shut up, <em>shut up!</em>” She lunged toward Xander and Amy. Giles and Oz were barely able to stop her. Giles had a second to wonder if enhanced strength was a side effect of a human ingesting vampire blood before all his attention went back to the problem at hand.</p>
<p>Lucy kept fighting but Amy didn’t try to turn anyone else into a rat. That was progress.</p>
<p>“Lucy, listen to me,” Giles said sternly. “You do not want to kill Xander. He’s your friend.”</p>
<p>“I love him!” Lucy said. “<em>Everyone </em>does. They won’t stop thinking about him. It hurts.” She attempted to wrench herself free once more, but when she failed all the fight seemed to go out of her. She sagged towards the floor and Giles found himself supporting her rather than trying to hold her still. “No Xander, no thoughts. I don’t want to die, Mr. Giles.”</p>
<p>Giles frowned. “You are not going to die.”</p>
<p>Stopgap placation delivered, Giles moved on to using logic. Lucy said that everyone was thinking about Xander. Thinking, not talking. She could have extrapolated that from all the girls at school going mad over him, but she would have had to be clear-headed for that and as she was under the love spell herself that wasn’t possible. Removing all the other options that required clear-headedness left only one thing that it could be. Unfortunately, it wasn’t the best time to ask Lucy how long she’d been a telepath for.</p>
<p>“Buffy has been turned into a rat,” Giles said instead. “She is somewhere in the building. I need you and Oz to go find her.” The school was nearly empty. Lucy would probably be alright once she was further away from Amy and Xander. “Keep her contained somewhere once you’ve got her. Can you do that?”</p>
<p>After a moment, Lucy nodded. “Yeah. Oz is all with the calm.”</p>
<p>“Good.” Assuming that he properly understood what she was saying.  </p>
<p>Giles helped Lucy stand despite her shaking legs and she left the library with Oz. Buffy couldn’t have gone far. They would find her before anything bad could happen.</p>
<p>Then Giles turned to Xander and Amy. “We will figure out how to undo both the love spell and Buffy’s transformation.”</p>
<p>“Research party,” Xander said. “Finally, something normal.”</p>
<p>It did seem normal, until Jenny came into the library and started fighting with Amy over Xander. Then there was quite a bit more magic being thrown around than there usually was when they were doing research.</p>
<p>“Enough!” Giles finally shouted. “Xander, go home. Lock yourself away. You’re only causing trouble here.” He was surprised that more girls hadn’t thought to find Xander in the one place in school where he spent the most time.</p>
<p>Xander was happy to get out of there. Once he was gone, Amy and Jenny could focus on finding the spells they needed. Giles found the first one, Jenny found the second and then they all went to the chemistry labs to cast them. Unfortunately, Oz and Lucy had captured Rat-Buffy in a cage in the first lab they chose and...well...long story short, Lucy ended up unconscious and Giles, Jenny and Amy had to undo Amy’s spells in a different lab.</p>
<p>“Do that one first,” Giles said, gesturing to the setup for undoing the love spell.</p>
<p>Amy picked up the necklace that had apparently belonged to Cordelia and swung it in circles above the beaker. When Giles finished reading the incantation she dropped it in and the beaker let out a puff of silvery smoke. Almost immediately Amy and Jenny looked confused.</p>
<p> Jenny shook her head. “What the hell?”</p>
<p>Giles pushed his glasses up the bridge of his nose. “I’ve been asking myself the same question. Would you mind going and telling Oz to let Buffy out of that cage?”</p>
<p>Jenny shook her head again, but she said that she would. Giles waited a few seconds after the door closed behind her before instructing Amy to begin the next spell. She burnt the herbs and said the words that were supposed to turn Buffy back into a human. Again there was a puff of smoke.</p>
<p>“Did it work?” Amy asked.</p>
<p>Jenny opened the door. “Could I have your jacket, Rupert? Buffy needs it more than you.”</p>
<p>Giles stripped off his jacket and handed it to her. He imagined he could feel himself blushing.</p>
<p>Amy sighed with relief. “Sounds like it worked.”</p>
<p>The aftermath of the love spell would be wrapped up with the usual inclination of Sunnydale citizens to rationalize and ignore everything supernatural. That left only one thing for Giles to deal with.</p>
<hr/>
<p>Lucy had come to when Amy undid the love spell. She hadn’t done anything since then except get Buffy her gym uniform from her locker and twist her fingers together in a way that looked to Giles as if it were painful. Giles sent her and Buffy home. It was late and Lucy didn’t seem to be in any shape to talk.</p>
<p>Giles knocked on the door of the Summers house the next morning. It was Saturday, so he wasn’t surprised when Joyce Summers opened the door and allowed him to come inside.</p>
<p>“Buffy and Lucy are still asleep,” she said after offering him a cup of coffee, which he accepted for the caffeine alone, though tea would have been much preferred. “What exactly happened last night?”</p>
<p>Giles raised his eyebrows. “You don’t remember?”</p>
<p>Joyce blushed. “Oh, I remember. I’m hoping I’m remembering wrong.” She ducked her head and took a sip of her coffee.</p>
<p>“Love spell gone bad,” Giles said shortly before turning his attention to his own drink.</p>
<p>Once they were able to look at each other again, Giles asked when Joyce thought he would be able to speak with Lucy.</p>
<p>“I could wake her up if it’s important,” Joyce offered.</p>
<p>“Oh, no, that’s quite alright. Yesterday was tiring for everyone.” Giles took another sip of his coffee.</p>
<p>Joyce began arguing that she didn’t want to make him wait when he must have had other things to do, but that argument was made irrelevant when Lucy came into the kitchen. Lucy looked at Giles warily. He would have thought that his presence was unexpected if she’d shown the slightest bit of surprise or if she hadn’t clearly taken the time to change out of her pajamas.</p>
<p>“Morning, Mr. Giles,” Lucy said. “I guess we need to talk.”</p>
<p>Giles put down his coffee. “Yes, we do.”</p>
<p>Lucy looked at her aunt out of the corner of her eye. “Living room?”</p>
<p>“You do remember that I know about all this magic stuff now, don’t you?” Joyce crossed her arms. “You can talk about things in front of me.”</p>
<p>Lucy’s cheeks turned pink. She opened her mouth and closed it without saying anything.</p>
<p>“I do apologize, but I believe Lucy doesn’t wish to talk about this particular subject in front of you at this time,” Giles said. And he was sorry. Keeping secrets from Joyce now that she knew about Buffy’s calling wasn’t something that he wanted to do. She deserved to know what was going on. However, telepathy was a dangerous thing and if Lucy wanted to keep it a secret then he certainly wouldn’t fight her on it.</p>
<p>Joyce pursed her lips. “I’ll be upstairs then.” She shot Giles a glare as she left the room.</p>
<p>Giles and Lucy sat down on the couch. Lucy talked, Giles listened and the longer Lucy spoke the angrier Giles got.</p>
<p>“There was a doctor in the cancer ward who looked after all the kids,” Lucy said. “We thought he was nice. He would joke with us while we were getting chemo, giving us a distraction, you know? And it worked. No one noticed when he added things to people’s IVs. At first kids died and we all thought it was their cancer. Then later I guess he’d started fixing things and...Rose killed herself. She was in so much pain because everything everyone was thinking was in her head all the time. The other doctors thought she might have a brain tumour making her hallucinate, but it was because of what Dr. Capson did to her. I was lucky. Quinn...my boyfriend...we had it happen within a few days of each other. It happened to me first. I don’t really remember much of what happened afterwards until I heard his voice in my head speaking to me, directly to me, not normal thoughts. He gave me an anchor and I did the same for him. We got to live because of a coincidence. That was nine months ago, I think. Like I said, I don’t remember all of it.”</p>
<p>Giles spoke through clenched teeth. “And this doctor was trying to make telepaths on purpose?”</p>
<p>Lucy nodded. “That’s what it looked like. I didn’t really get to go through his head much because my mom...” She swallowed. “He didn’t work with adults.”</p>
<p>Giles resisted the urge to clean his glasses. He was sure that with as angry as he was he would end up crushing them the second he took them off.</p>
<p>“Telepathy is rare in humans,” he said instead. “Human telepaths are...highly prized by some.”</p>
<p>“You mean he’d get a lot of money for us,” Lucy said. She tapped the side of her head when Giles looked at her with surprise.</p>
<p>“Ah, yes. I would advise you not to tell anyone else about this.”</p>
<p>“I told Buffy already.” A slightly hysterical laugh escaped Lucy’s lips. “And Spike and Drusilla already know. I bet Dru’s told her daddy by now.” She laughed again. “She can’t keep secrets from Angelus.”</p>
<p>“Oh dear.” Giles could only imagine how Angelus would use that piece of information against them. “Then I suppose you should let the others know, so we’re all on the same page.”</p>
<p>Lucy nodded. “Secrets are kind of a bad thing to have right now, aren’t they? At least, secrets that Angelus knows.”</p>
<p>That they were.</p>
<p>Giles left after a few more minutes of quiet discussion about Angelus, getting Lucy caught up on the few bits of information she’d missed after she’d stopped helping with that particular research. He nodded when she asked if he was sure he couldn’t stay longer.</p>
<p>“I have several things to get done today,” he said. One of which was looking up a certain doctor and finding a curse he could use to make his life hell.</p>
  </div></div>
<a name="section0021"><h2>21. Passion</h2></a>
<div class="story"><div class="fff_chapter_notes fff_head_notes"><b>Notes for the Chapter:</b><blockquote class="userstuff"><p>The song lyrics mentioned in this chapter are from "Violent" by Four Star Mary, the band whose songs were used for Dingoes Ate My Baby.</p></blockquote></div><div class="userstuff module">
    
    <p>
  <strong>
    <em>Lucy</em>
  </strong>
</p>
<p>Lucy closed the book she’d been reading and rested her head on the cover. She was in the library again. Or maybe she was in the library still. It was kind of hard to tell. “What time is it?”</p>
<p>“Almost five,” Buffy said. There was a faint thud as she punched or kicked some part of the padding on Mr. Giles’s body. Judging by how Mr. Giles sounded, she’d probably kicked him in the gut.</p>
<p>“What day is it?” Lucy asked.</p>
<p>“Can’t you read our minds and find out?” Xander’s voice was dripping with sarcasm.</p>
<p>Lucy didn’t say anything. She didn’t even bother to lift her head. Xander had been acting like this ever since she’d told their group that she was a mind-reader. She just had to hope he’d get over it.</p>
<p>Though, in the spirit of the whole not keeping secrets thing, she had also mentioned that Spike was alive. Xander might have been angrier about that. Who was she kidding? He was definitely angrier about that. The mind-reading was a convenient scapegoat.</p>
<p>“It’s Tuesday,” Willow said after a pause. “Are you feeling okay?”</p>
<p>It was tempting to lie. Very tempting. But they’d all agreed that lying was of the bad right now, no matter how much panic not lying would cause.</p>
<p>“I’ve been having these dreams,” Lucy said. “Drusilla is scared about something. I think she might have had a vision.”</p>
<p>The library went silent. Lucy took her head off her book and saw that Mr. Giles, Buffy, Willow and Xander were all staring at her with expressions ranging from alarm to fear to (as predicted) panic.</p>
<p>“Why didn’t you say something?” Buffy demanded.</p>
<p>At the same time, Xander asked, “What’s scaring her?”</p>
<p>A shrug was an accurate answer to both of those questions. Lucy shrugged and was saved from providing a verbal response by Ms. Calendar entering the library. She was carrying a book in one hand and a large cardboard box in the other.</p>
<p>“Hi, everyone.” Ms. Calendar put her book on the counter and fumbled with the box, which she had braced against her hip. “I have some news.”</p>
<p>Buffy crossed her arms. “Good or bad?” She still hadn’t forgiven Ms. Calendar for the whole being a spy for the Kalderash clan who’d cursed Angel thing.</p>
<p>There was a lot of passionate resentment going around.</p>
<p>“Good, I hope.” Ms. Calendar got the box on the counter and turned to pick up the book. “I’ve found the—” She cut herself off, eyeing Lucy hesitantly.</p>
<p>Lucy stood up. “This is me excusing myself from the strategy meeting. I’ll see you at home, Buffy.”</p>
<p>As Lucy was walking past Ms. Calendar, the little Drusilla bubble in the back of her mind expanded. She found herself turning around and delivering a slap to Ms. Calendar’s face.</p>
<p>“Bad dolly,” Drusilla said with Lucy’s voice. “You’re trying to take my daddy away. We’ll burn you up.”</p>
<p>Lucy was reaching for Ms. Calendar’s neck with both hands—what was it with her trying to strangle people?—when Buffy grabbed her from behind and dragged her away. She struggled for a moment before Drusilla gave up and let her have her body back.</p>
<p>“Sorry,” Lucy said. She looked at Ms. Calendar. “Sorry.”</p>
<p>Ms. Calendar rubbed her cheek. “It’s okay.”</p>
<p>Drusilla struck again. This time she sent images into Lucy’s mind, imaginings of what she and Angelus would do when they found Ms. Calendar. Stitched lips, a pattern of bites covering her skin like lace, and blood, always blood. Lucy was thankful that Buffy was still holding onto her. She wasn’t sure she would have still been standing when Drusilla was done if Buffy wasn’t holding her up.</p>
<p>“Ow,” Lucy said, because that seemed to explain her situation in the smallest number of syllables. Her head felt like it was going to burst. Buffy helped her to sit down on the floor with her back against the book cage. Lucy closed her eyes to try to reduce some of the pain light was causing.</p>
<p>“So, maybe we know what the crazy vampire lady is scared of,” Xander said after a few seconds.</p>
<p>Yeah, maybe they did.</p>
<p>It was a while before Lucy felt up to moving. Buffy carried her to Mr. Giles’s office so that she could lie down and the rest of them could talk without her hearing. Drusilla continued to be present in her mind, but she had done a one-eighty and was giving Lucy mental cuddles and being all comforting. That was somehow scarier than when Drusilla tried to hurt her. Lucy lay on the floor in the dark and, of course, she fell asleep. Drusilla’s presence hung uncomfortably heavy over her dreams. When she woke up, that was all she remembered.</p>
<p>Lucy was still blinking away grogginess when Buffy came back into the office. “Lucy? We’re going to head home now. Need me to help you up?”</p>
<p>“I’m okay.” Lucy proved herself right by getting to her feet without falling over. “Were plans made?”</p>
<p>Buffy nodded but didn’t say anything about what those plans might be. Lucy didn’t ask. On their way out of the library they passed Mr. Giles and Ms. Calendar talking quietly by the counter. Drusilla whimpered when Lucy looked at Ms. Calendar.</p>
<p>“Ms. Calendar?” Lucy continued when Ms. Calendar turned to her. “Drusilla is scared of you. Whatever you’re doing, do it fast, before Angelus finds out.”</p>
<p>Ms. Calendar pursed her lips and nodded. “I will. And Lucy? You be careful too.”</p>
<p>Lucy smirked. “Aren’t I always?”</p>
<p>Mr. Giles coughed and laughed at the same time. Buffy rolled her eyes.</p>
<p>Ms. Calendar smiled. “I’m not going to answer that.”</p>
<p>Whatever Ms. Calendar’s plan was, the others seemed to think that it was pretty solid. Willow and Mr. Giles dialed down the constant Angelus research from “might happen any day” to “we have to panic, but not that much”, which looked the same as “might happen any day” except the reduced bags under their eyes indicated that they were catching up on sleep. That wouldn’t have happened if they didn’t have some confidence. Lucy actually caught Buffy humming on Friday morning.</p>
<p>Aunt Joy noticed too. “You seem happy, Buffy. Anything I should know about?”</p>
<p>Buffy quickly shook her head. “Nope, just feeling cheery. Had to happen eventually with all the overwhelming doom and gloom.”</p>
<p>“I don’t think that’s how it works,” Lucy said. “And don’t you have a French test today?”</p>
<p>Buffy’s face fell. “Phooey.”</p>
<p>Lucy and Aunt Joy looked at each other and giggled.</p>
<p>Lucy had a biology test first thing and Mr. Charles let them leave as soon as they were done. Oz was out of the room in fifteen minutes. At the twenty minute mark, Lucy joined him in the free-period hangout. She sat down next to him on one of the couches and took a book out of her bag. Oz was a good person to read around. He didn’t interrupt her reading with talk. Her book was one she had borrowed from Mr. Giles about Ancient Egyptian magic and mystery schools. It was full of untranslated sections of books written in hieroglyphics and hieratic that Lucy was slowly puzzling her way though. She had left copies of several of her translations between the book’s pages to make things easier in case they ended up being something they needed later.</p>
<p>“Playing the Bronze tomorrow night,” Devon announced when he dropped onto the couch across from them about ten minutes later. “We’ve got a new song.”</p>
<p>It wasn’t the first time Devon had sprung new music on them the day before a gig. Lucy and Oz accepted the sheet music he shoved into their hands and began reading it over. Lucy’s eyebrows were raised to her hairline by the end of the first page.</p>
<p>“‘It <em>slays </em>me every time’?” Lucy sighed and shook her head. “Guess I should be glad we’re not playing the Shelter.” She could only imagine how the demons there would react to that line.</p>
<p>Oz pointed to a bar on the second page that Lucy hadn’t gotten to yet. “This cord won’t work.”</p>
<p>Devon snatched the pages back. “Where?”</p>
<p>Oz moved over to the other couch to help Devon with his music. Lucy went back to her book.</p>
<p>In the end, Devon decided that their new song was not ready to be performed. Lucy was thankful for that because it meant that she didn’t have to memorize new music the day before it had to be played. They would sound decent at the Bronze, and since she couldn’t talk the boys out of cancelling on account of Angelus that was the best option she could hope for.</p>
<p>She would have to double-check that there was extra holy water in Oz’s van. When they left the bottles lying around, Devon usually ended up drinking it. Good for making him unpalatable to vampires, bad for the rest of them being able to defend themselves.</p>
<p>Lucy didn’t see Buffy, Willow or Xander during their free period. She assumed that they were in the library, so to stay out of their way she took her book outside and sat down underneath one of the trees behind the school. It was a spot that she’d found back in November, when she’d thought that Spike was dead. No one else ever seemed to go there, so when she’d wanted to be alone—when she’d needed to be alone—it was a good place.</p>
<p><em>Pretty little bird, </em>Drusilla crooned. <em>Break her neck.</em></p>
<p>Well, she was almost alone.</p>
<p>Lucy groaned. “Why are you even awake? It’s the middle of the day.”</p>
<p><em>Broken neck and broken wings</em>. Drusilla’s reply wasn’t a reply at all. <em>Such a bad magpie.</em></p>
<p>Lucy sighed and closed her book. Her free period was almost over anyway. Hopefully Drusilla would let her concentrate during class.</p>
<p>Yeah, and Angelus might save them all the trouble and walk out into the sun.</p>
<p>A shiver ran through Lucy’s body. She didn’t want<em> Angel</em> dead, but Angelus...She rubbed her arms, trying to tame the goosebumps that had appeared. No, thinking like that was a bad idea. Lucy was even more convinced of that when Buffy broke down crying after she got home from school. She’d stayed late to finish whatever they were working on in the library. Aunt Joy hugged her and asked what was wrong.</p>
<p>“We...tried...to...give...Angel...his...soul...back,” Buffy said in between sobs. “It didn’t work!”</p>
<p>“Oh, honey.” Aunt Joy hugged Buffy closer to her. “I’m so sorry. Maybe you could try again?”</p>
<p>Lucy squeezed Buffy’s hand and didn’t say anything.</p>
<hr/>
<p>Lucy pried her eyes open. There was something sticky on her right eyelid that made it harder for that eye to open, but eventually she managed. She couldn’t see anything but darkness. She didn’t try to move anything else, even though she was lying on a cold floor with a wall pressing against her back. Her head hurt <em>so much</em>. She slammed her mental walls into place to try to reduce the pain but it didn’t help one bit. If she tried to move she was sure she’d pass out again, probably after throwing up.</p>
<p>She breathed in slowly. The air was musty and damp. She tasted metal in the back of her mouth. Where was she? The floor under her felt like stone and so did the wall when she haltingly ran her fingers over it. That meant that she couldn’t be at school, at home or in the factory. She didn’t remember going anywhere that had stone walls and floors. Actually, she didn’t remember much of anything past leaving the Bronze after their set. A blur of movement and then...She’d hit her head. That explained a lot.</p>
<p>There was the screeching sound of metal on metal. A door squeaked open. Lucy looked in the direction of the noise but still saw nothing but darkness. Heavy footsteps made their way towards her. She forced herself to sit up and meant to raise her arms in front of her but her throbbing head wouldn’t let her.</p>
<p>“Well, don’t you look terrible?” a voice said.</p>
<p>Lucy’s blood turned to ice. She knew what had happened now.</p>
<p>When Angelus spoke again he was right in front of her, probably crouching or kneeling so that they were face-to-face. “Oh, and this.” He touched her forehead above her right eye and sharp pain knifed through her head. She could feel the crusted edges of skin bending and blood sticking to his fingers as he pulled them away. “This just looks painful.” There was a pause before he added, “Tastes good though.”</p>
<p>“You—” Lucy barely got the word out before Angelus put a finger to her lips. She immediately fell silent. It would be easy, so easy, for him to break her neck. She didn’t think that was what he wanted to do though. Angelus didn’t do easy, not for his victims.</p>
<p>“What kind of friend would I be if I let you walk around in pain?” Angelus tilted her head back and poured a bitter liquid into her mouth. Lucy sputtered and tried to spit it out but he held a hand over her nose and mouth until her body gave her no choice but to swallow. When she did, she wished that she’d been allowed to suffocate.</p>
<p>Pain, sharp, burning, never-ending pain, erupted in every part of her body. Lucy screamed. That was all that she could do. She wasn’t even allowed the relief of passing out.</p>
<p>After what felt like forever, the pain did end. Lucy opened her eyes. Angelus had moved her or turned on a light. She could see the room she was in now, though there wasn’t much to see. The walls were bare stone, there were no windows and a single light bulb was glowing in the middle of the ceiling. Angelus was standing a stone’s throw away. It could have been a stake’s throw, but Lucy wasn’t a Slayer and she could tell by the weight of her pockets that Angelus has stripped her of any weapons. Her head didn’t hurt anymore, but without at least a cross and some holy water she couldn’t fight her way out of there. Lucy stood up slowly, never taking her eyes off of the vampire. Angelus watched her with a cruel smirk on his face.</p>
<p>“You know, if you let me go home now you won’t have to worry about Buffy staking you when she comes to get me,” Lucy said.</p>
<p>Angelus laughed. It was big and loud and nothing like Angel’s awkward chuckling. “You really are a riot, Lu. I can see why Spike kept you around.”</p>
<p>Before Lucy could say anything in response, Angelus had a hand around her neck and slammed her against the wall. Her body was wracked with pain. Lucy’s screams turned into a whimper when the pain ended. </p>
<p>“That healing potion I gave you? It has some side effects,” Angelus said. “For the next hour or two it’ll heal anything that happens to you, but I’ve been told it’ll hurt like hell.”</p>
<p>That was a good way to put it. When Angelus grabbed her wrist, the healing hurt more than him crushing her bones.</p>
<p>Lucy barely heard the clinking of chains over her screaming. Angelus wrenched her arms upward and the cold weight of shackles snapped shut around her wrists.</p>
<p>Despite her wrist being broken only seconds before, Lucy yanked at the chains. She could feel her heart beating wildly, telling her to run away from this monster wearing her friend’s face. It was a little too late for that.</p>
<p>Angelus grinned. “Didn’t you and Spike ever try chains? Or maybe you and Dru? Dru loves chains.”</p>
<p>Drusilla did seem to like chains, but she always thought about being the one chained up. It seemed clear where she got that from.</p>
<p>Angelus walked over to a little table by the door that Lucy could barely make out in the dim light. “I know Buffy is going to come try to rescue you,” he said conversationally. “That’s why I really want to enjoy this before we get interrupted. Not going to lie, I kind of wanted Willow. I’ve got a bit of a soft spot for her, you know? But don’t think I’m not happy to have you here. I mean, last time I tortured somebody, they didn’t even have chainsaws.”</p>
<p>Lucy swallowed once and decided not to say anything. He was going to hurt her no matter what, wasn’t he? She’d only make it worse for herself if she made him mad, and she wasn’t going to give him the satisfaction of hearing her beg.</p>
<p>She would probably be begging soon enough, but it was a nice thought.</p>
<p>Angelus ran his hand over the things on the table. Lucy peeked into his mind for a second and saw knives, pliers, handsaws and other tools. She shut him out before she could see what he was planning. She didn’t want to see that.</p>
<p>“For now, let’s go with...” Angelus picked up one of his tools and turned back around, “a classic.” Light glinted off the blade of his hunting knife.</p>
<p>As Angelus closed in on her, Lucy became determined not to scream. Then she changed her mind and thought that she’d better scream so that someone could find her. Then she changed her mind again. No one aside from Buffy and the gang would really bother to listen for screams in Sunnydale, and only Buffy would have a chance of fighting Angelus off. Lucy didn’t want to get anyone killed.</p>
<p>“You’re quiet.” Angelus gently rested the flat of his knife against Lucy’s cheek. He drew it along her skin with a feather light touch, skimming over her jaw and down her chest until he reached her waist. With his other hand he pushed the hem of her shirt up to expose her stomach. “Huh. Someone got here before me. Did Drusilla try to saw you in half?”</p>
<p>Only a little. With her fingernails. Repeatedly.  </p>
<p>Lucy gritted her teeth. “None of your business.”</p>
<p>Angelus smirked and cut a burning line across her stomach. He watched with fascination as it healed. “Neat.”</p>
<p>Lucy kept her jaw clenched shut, afraid she might let out some lingering screams. She’d made a low whine in her throat while the cut healed, but that was all. She’d even managed to keep her eyes open. Really, after what Drusilla had done to her, this was nothing. The pain had surprised her the first few times, that’s all.</p>
<p>That was what she kept telling herself anyway.</p>
<p>Angelus cut into her skin again, deeper this time. “Come on, Lu. It’s not as fun if you don’t scream. I’d settle for a bit of crying.”</p>
<p>Lucy didn’t scream. She didn’t cry. She only whimpered, until Angelus made deeper cuts. Then she cried.</p>
<p>Angelus smiled.</p>
  </div></div>
<a name="section0022"><h2>22. Killed by Death</h2></a>
<div class="story"><div class="userstuff module">
    
    <p>
  <strong>
    <em>Buffy</em>
  </strong>
</p>
<p>Mom was waiting downstairs when Buffy got home a few hours after sunrise. Buffy looked at her and shook her head.</p>
<p>Mom collapsed onto the couch and buried her face in her hands. “Where could she be?”</p>
<p>Buffy shook her head again. She had been looking for Lucy for two days. Oz had seen Angelus grab her from the back of the Bronze on Saturday and since then, nothing. Even Willy didn’t have any information, and he knew everything that went on in Sunnydale’s demonic parts. Well, apparently not everything. He didn’t know where Lucy was.</p>
<p>“Willow wants to try the resouling spell,” Buffy said. “Giles and Ms. Calendar think it’s too dangerous.” Dark spots danced across her vision and she firmly blinked them away. “What do you think?” Since all the other adults had already weighed in it was only fair that Mom got to voice her opinion.</p>
<p>Mom looked up, blinking. “I...I don’t know. Mr. Giles and Ms. Calendar are the ones who do magic. Does Willow want to do the spell on her own?”</p>
<p>She did. Something about parallels and maidens that Giles and Ms. Calendar agreed with but didn’t want Willow to risk her safety for. Buffy was all on their side when it came to not making with the risky, but if Willow could give Angel his soul back, and now with Lucy being in danger...</p>
<p>They’d know if Lucy was dead. Angelus would make sure they knew.</p>
<p>Buffy sat down next to her mom. “I’m not going to school today.”</p>
<p>“I already called and told them you have that flu that’s been going around,” Mom said.</p>
<p>Maybe that had been a bad idea, because Buffy got the flu. She ended up in the hospital, which was so not of the good. One, she couldn’t look for Lucy if she was in the hospital, and two, she was in the hospital. She hated being in the hospital. It had been bad enough when Lucy was there and she was only visiting. Lucy didn’t mind being in hospital. She didn’t feel like she was trapped and in danger, not in hospital anyway. Buffy hated hospitals.</p>
<p>Buffy’s fever was so high that she was delirious and hallucinating. Except that demon she saw walking past her room didn’t feel like a hallucination. Her Slaydar was pinging.</p>
<p>When Giles, Willow, Cordelia and Xander came to visit the next day she told them what she had seen. Xander thought that she was hallucinating, but Cordelia saying that if the Slayer thought she’d seen a demon then it was probably a demon made him change his mind. Being thankful for Cordelia was such a weird feeling.</p>
<p>“I will attempt to find any creature that matches your description,” Giles said. “It may take some time. I’m afraid my usual assistant will be otherwise occupied.” He looked at Willow.</p>
<p>“Giles is letting me try the resouling spell,” Willow said with a smile.</p>
<p>“I am letting you deliberate with Ms. Calendar and her online coven. If you cannot come up with a way to enact the curse safely then we will come up with another plan.” Giles looked at Willow sternly. “This is very powerful magic, Willow. We can’t go off half-cocked.”</p>
<p>It was the same argument Giles had been using since Saturday. Buffy was pretty sure that they could all recite it word-for-word.</p>
<p>Since she apparently wasn’t fully recovered yet, Giles wheeled Buffy back to her room from the small garden they’d escaped to for another night at Sunnydale General. When she sat on the bed there was a crinkling sound. Buffy frowned and searched the bed until she found the sheet of paper that was half under the pillow. She looked at it and then held it out for Giles and her friends (and Cordelia) to see. “I think we need to talk to some of the kids.”</p>
<p>Giles studied the crayon drawing of a sharp-toothed, hook-nosed monster looming over a small child. “I believe you may be correct.”</p>
<p>They found the children’s ward easily enough. All of the kids seemed to have gotten the same flu that Buffy had. Most of them were lying in their beds, but one boy was sitting at a child-sized table with crayons and paper spread out in front of him.</p>
<p>“I think there are too many of us to talk to one kid,” Xander whispered. “We’ll be outside. Maybe breaking into the records room.” He, Cordelia and Willow retreated back to the door.</p>
<p>Buffy sat down next to the boy. He was drawing another picture of the demon that she’d seen the night before. Buffy took out the drawing she’d found on her bed and flattened it out on the table. The boy looked at it for a moment before silently turning towards Buffy.</p>
<p>“Did you draw this?” Buffy asked.</p>
<p>The boy nodded. “Can you see it?”</p>
<p>Buffy guessed that he meant the actual demon and not the drawing. “It went past my room last night.”</p>
<p>“Adults can’t see it,” the boy said. “It’s scary.”</p>
<p>“I know.” Buffy tried to smile. “Tell me if you see it again, okay?”</p>
<p>The boy nodded. He picked up a black crayon and started colouring in the demon’s coat. After a few seconds he whispered so quietly that Buffy would have never heard him if she hadn’t been a Slayer. “I’m scared.”</p>
<p>The tightening in Buffy’s chest had nothing to do with her flu. She managed an actual smile, though it was strained. “I’ll protect you.”</p>
<p>The boy looked up at her with big, almost pleading, eyes. “Promise?”</p>
<p>Buffy nodded. “I promise.”</p>
<p>She couldn’t save Lucy yet, but she could save these kids.</p>
<p>Then she would save her cousin. This wouldn’t end like it had with Celia.</p>
<hr/>
<p>The demon was called Der Kindestod. It sucked the life out of healing children and apparently had no problem killing doctors who were helping them get better faster. Buffy knew that it was what had killed her cousin Celia years ago while she was in the room and could do nothing to save her. Not this time.</p>
<p>Buffy was sitting up in her bed watching the hallway through the open door. Giles was in the chair next to her. They’d gotten sent back to her room after a nurse had caught them lurking in the hallway. Xander, Willow and Cordelia had stationed themselves in the waiting room after Giles had come back to the hospital with information on the demon. The children’s ward was between them, closer to Buffy and Giles than Willow, Xander and Cordelia.</p>
<p>“I can just break its neck?” Buffy checked again.</p>
<p>Giles nodded. “Anything that separates its head from its body will kill it. Just remember that its spine goes up both sides of its neck.”</p>
<p>Buffy would have liked to have a nice battle axe, but it was a little hard to sneak weapons into the hospital.</p>
<p>There were footsteps in the hallway. Buffy was frantically running through excuses for the nurse coming by on her rounds when the sight of peroxide blond hair made her jump out of bed. Giles leapt to his feet second later.</p>
<p>“Easy, Slayer,” Spike said. “Watcher. I’m not here to cause trouble.”</p>
<p>Buffy scowled. “You’re walking. How are you walking? Lucy said—” Her voice cracked and she broke off the sentence.</p>
<p>A muscle twitched in Spike’s jaw. “Angelus has been walking ‘round practically dressed in her blood with that stupid smile on his face.” A low growl filled the room and Spike’s game face snapped into place. “He’s got Dru twisted ‘round his finger, hanging off his every word. And he thinks I can’t do anything about it.”</p>
<p>“Get to the point,” Buffy told him.</p>
<p>Spike took a deep breath and shook off his game face. “Help me get Lucy back. One of us fights Angelus, the other gets her out.”</p>
<p>“What are you talking about?” Buffy asked. What Spike was saying did not compute.</p>
<p>“Working together to save your cousin from your Boyfriend of the Year.” Spike drew his lips back from his human-shaped teeth in a snarl. “Do you think I’d be asking for your help if I could do it on my own, Slayer?”</p>
<p>A shrill scream sounded from the direction of the children’s ward before Buffy could reply. Spike turned to look and Buffy pushed him out into the hallway and ran past him, Giles following after her.</p>
<p>In the children’s ward, a little girl was screaming and staring in horror at the invisible force pinning her to her bed. One of the other girls was throwing wooden blocks that seemed to bounce off of thin air but otherwise weren’t doing anything.</p>
<p>Buffy froze. She couldn’t see the demon. She was supposed to be able to see the demon. How could she break its neck if she couldn’t see it?</p>
<p>“That’s a right ugly bugger,” Spike said. Apparently he’d followed Buffy too.</p>
<p>Buffy shook off her hesitation and aimed a full body tackle at the air that the girl’s blocks were bouncing off of. She collided with a heavy object covered in something rough that she hoped was the demon’s coat. The girl on the bed scrambled away into the arms of the girl who had been defending her while Buffy and the demon crashed into the floor. The demon twisted in Buffy’s grip and then Buffy was flying back across the room. She landed on the floor next to Spike with a crack that knocked the air out of her lungs. That was going to bruise. At least none of her ribs were broken. She knew what broken ribs felt like.</p>
<p>Spike scoffed. “Didn’t you see that punch it threw at you, Slayer?”</p>
<p>“Kind of hard when it’s invisible,” Buffy grumbled as she pushed herself to her feet. She almost missed seeing Spike’s raised eyebrow before she was knocked over again.</p>
<p>“Hey, ugly!” Spike swung his fist at the air above Buffy’s head and the force holding her down went away. “Why don’t you fight someone your own size?”</p>
<p>Buffy got back on her feet and quickly jumped out of the way when Spike said the demon was coming at her from her left. He punched the air again and there was a crash as the demon collided with one of the empty beds. A tangle of sheets took the form of what looked like an arm and a leg.</p>
<p>Buffy grinned.</p>
<p>One cleverly thrown bedsheet later, the demon was visible enough that Buffy had no trouble beating it into the ground and twisting its head around until she heard its neck snap twice. She stepped back from the corpse and blew a strand of her hair out of her face. Giles looked in from the doorway. At some point during the fight he’d gathered up the children and ushered them out of the room. A boy and a girl were also peering around the door frame.</p>
<p>“We’re good,” Buffy said to her Watcher. Then she turned to Spike. “What did you say about Lucy?”</p>
<p>They had to clean up the dead demon first. Xander and Giles lugged it outside to a dumpster while Cordelia kept watch and Buffy and Willow got the kids tucked back into bed. The floor was wobbling under Buffy’s feet. She wasn’t sick enough to see the demon but she was sick enough that fighting it made her head spin. It figured.</p>
<p>Spike lurked in a corner where Buffy could keep an eye on him. At one point he stepped out of the room and Buffy heard him heading off some nurses who’d come to see what was going on. He was shockingly polite when he told them not to worry, some of the kids had nightmares and everything was fine now. Then he asked one of the nurses how his daughter was. Buffy glared at him when he came back into the room. Spike glared back.</p>
<p>“No more monsters?” the girl who the demon had been trying to kill asked Buffy.</p>
<p>Buffy swallowed to get rid of the lump forming in her throat. “No more monsters. Get some sleep, okay? I bet you’ll be going home in the morning.”</p>
<p>“‘kay.” The girl yawned and almost immediately fell asleep. The death grip she’d had on Buffy’s hand went slack.</p>
<p>“That the last of them, Slayer?” Spike asked.</p>
<p>Buffy stood up and crossed her arms. “It wouldn’t kill you to have some sympathy, Spike. You’re already dead.”</p>
<p>“Uh, Buffy?” Willow spoke quietly even though she knew as well as Buffy did that Spike could hear every word she said. “What’s he doing here?”</p>
<p>“He knows where Lucy is,” Buffy said. “He’s going to tell us.”</p>
<p>Willow’s eyes went wide. She looked from Buffy to Spike and back again. “But...but...Not that that’s a bad thing because of course it isn’t a bad thing to find Lucy but what if he’s lying? And why does he care?”</p>
<p>“I have my reasons.” Spike looked at Buffy. “And I’m not telling you, I’m going with you. You really think I’m going to risk you screwing this up?”</p>
<p>Buffy wanted to yell at him for saying that. How could he think that she would ever do anything to hurt her family? He was a soulless monster, but he wasn’t stupid. She didn’t yell though. It wouldn’t be fair to the kids who’d finally gotten to sleep after being attacked by a life-draining demon.</p>
<p>“Tonight,” Buffy said. “We’re going to save her tonight.”</p>
<p>Willow pointed out that Buffy was still sick. Spike said that they didn’t have time to waste. The three of them moved out to the hallway to have an argument that was cut short by Giles, Xander, and Cordelia returning from disposing of the body.</p>
<p>“Doesn’t being the Slayer come with, like, super healing?” Cordelia asked. “Buffy will be fine by tomorrow.”</p>
<p>Giles nodded slowly. “Though I wouldn’t have put it quite in those terms, Cordelia is correct.”</p>
<p>“Tomorrow then,” Spike grumbled. “We’ll have a stronger trail to follow anyway.” He stalked away from them without another word.</p>
<p>“What exactly were you talking about?” Giles asked.</p>
<p>Cordelia scoffed. “A rescue mission, obviously. Can we go home now? I need to take at least five showers.”</p>
<p>“You didn’t even touch the dumpster,” Xander said.</p>
<p>“I can’t help it if watching you bury a dead demon in garbage makes me feel gross,” Cordelia said. “So?”</p>
<p>“You are free to go,” Giles said. “Get home safely.” He waited until Cordelia was gone before turning to Buffy with the look on his face that always came before a lecture.</p>
<p>“I have some ideas for the spell, Giles,” Willow said before Giles’s lecture could get started. “But shouldn’t we go back to Buffy’s room first so we don’t get in trouble?”</p>
<p>“I should probably get some sleep,” Buffy admitted. Her eyelids were beginning to feel heavy and she was getting dizzy again. Maybe agreeing to mount the rescue mission tomorrow night had been a good idea.   </p>
<hr/>
<p>Buffy wasn’t surprised when Spike showed up at her house. He didn’t even knock, just opened the back door while they were having dinner. The three crosses nailed to the door didn’t seem to faze him at all, though it was good to know that the uninvite spell definitely worked.    </p>
<p>“Come on, Slayer. We’re burning moonlight.” Spike looked towards Mom for a second. “‘lo, Joyce.”</p>
<p>“William,” Mom said evenly. “Or do you prefer Spike?”</p>
<p>Buffy stood up, leaving her meal half finished. “I’ll be back soon, Mom. With Lucy.”</p>
<p>She took a stake, a knife and a sword with her. Light armaments for what would hopefully be an in-and-out rescue. She wouldn’t have to kill Angelus, only keep him busy long enough for Spike to get Lucy out and hurt him enough that he wouldn’t come after them. Maybe Willow would even convince Giles and Ms. Calendar that she should do the resouling spell tonight and Buffy wouldn’t have to fight Angelus at all.</p>
<p>Buffy kept her stake within easy reach.</p>
<p>Spike led the way through the streets. At intersections he’d pause and breathe in through his nose before choosing a direction and continuing. Buffy didn’t know what scent he was tracking. Angelus’s, maybe, or Lucy’s. They crossed a good chunk of Sunnydale before Spike gestured for her to stop.</p>
<p>“There,” he whispered, pointing to the very end of Crawford Street. “Scent’s strongest that way.”</p>
<p>“There’s a lot of abandoned houses there,” Buffy muttered. If she’d been on her own she would have had to search every one of them. Instead, Spike went straight to the mansion at the end of the street and they started looking for a way in. A sturdy tree and a handy open window on the second floor let them into an empty room with a layer of dust covering the floor. The floorboards creaked as they stepped into the hallway. Buffy winched.</p>
<p>When Angelus didn’t immediately appear out of the shadows and attack them, Buffy could breathe a little easier. But only a little.</p>
<p>They walked down the hallway in silence. Buffy held her sword at the ready. She paid close attention to the rooms they passed by, waiting for Angelus to step out of one of the doors. Spike didn’t appear to be paying attention to their surroundings at all, charging ahead with a single-mindedness that she almost envied.</p>
<p>The hallway turned into stairs that went down into large room with a high ceiling and an empty fireplace. The floor and walls were stone and there were French doors on either side of the room that led outside. It would have been a nice room if it weren’t so cold and if Angelus weren’t standing in the middle of it carrying a bloody knife in one hand.</p>
<p>Angelus grinned. “Spike and the Slayer. This is a surprise. Shouldn’t you be begging Drusilla to take you back, William?”</p>
<p>Spike growled and stepped into the room. “Listen here you bleein’—”</p>
<p>“Spike,” Buffy said. Spike went silent.</p>
<p>Angelus laughed. “She’s got you whipped! How long did that take, Buffy? You moved on so fast. I’m hurt.”</p>
<p>A drop of blood fell off Angelus’s knife and hit the floor. Buffy advanced with her sword raised. “Where’s Lucy?”</p>
<p>“Do you really think you’re going to save her?” Angelus smirked. “Poor, deluded little Buffy. Didn’t Rupert tell you that I always win?”</p>
<p>Buffy bared her teeth. “Didn’t anyone ever tell you that overconfidence is unattractive?”</p>
<p>Buffy swung her sword at Angelus, aiming for his left arm. He stopped the blade with his knife and then Buffy was fighting for her life. If she hadn’t been fighting her soulless boyfriend (they’d never actually broken up) with weapons on both sides then it would have been a normal Wednesday night.</p>
<p>Angelus’s strength and speed meant that Buffy had to work to stop him from getting inside her guard, even though she had the longer blade and should have had an advantage. She cut into his arm a few times but he didn’t even seem to notice.</p>
<p>A twist of Buffy’s wrist sent Angelus’s knife flying across the room. It landed near the spot where Spike had been standing when the fight started. Buffy could only hope that Spike had found Lucy and was getting her out of the mansion.</p>
<p>Angelus growled and put on his game face. “You shouldn’t have done that.”</p>
<p>He leapt towards her with his fangs bared and his hands contorted into claws. Buffy batted aside one of his arms but was unable to block the swipe he was taking at her with the other hand. He came within an inch of grabbing her arm before she whipped out her knife and stabbed the blade straight through his hand. That injury got his attention. He screamed and stumbled backwards. Then Buffy saw the burning white light gathering in his chest. Maybe that had more to do with Angelus screaming in pain than a measly knife wound.</p>
<p>Buffy knew magic when she saw it. She stepped back and watched as the light grew brighter for a moment before going out. Angelus was left kneeling on the floor, breathing hard despite his lack of needing to breathe.</p>
<p>The vampire looked up, and Buffy knew even before he spoke what the magic had done. His eyes were Angel’s again.</p>
<p>“Buffy?” Angel said. “What happened? I feel like it’s been months since I’ve seen you.”</p>
<p>Buffy blinked rapidly. She was too choked up to say anything. She shook her head.</p>
<p>A distant look crossed Angel’s face. Then he doubled over like he’d been shot in the stomach, his eyes squeezed shut and his un-knifed arm wrapped around his torso like it was the only thing holding him together. “Oh god. What have I done?”</p>
<p>Buffy crouched down and yanked her knife out of his hand. “Where’s Lucy?”</p>
<p>“Downstairs.” Angel pushed himself to his feet, seeming to completely ignore his injured hand and the smears of blood it left on the floor. “Hurry.”</p>
<p>Downstairs was a cellar with a wooden door that was wide open. Buffy ran in ahead of Angel and froze while her brain processed the scene in front of her.</p>
<p>Lucy was lying on the floor. She was breathing in short, sharp pants that made her entire body shutter. The chains around her wrists had clearly been torn out of the wall. Her skin and what little was left of her clothing was covered in blood. The injuries that drew Buffy’s eye most were the railroad spike pinning her legs together below the knee and what was probably a stab wound between her ribs that bubbled blood with every breath. There were more injuries that were harder to see because of the blood, but even all of those together wouldn’t have been enough to make Buffy pause for more than a moment. It was Spike, kneeling next to Lucy and pressing his bleeding wrist to her lips, which kept Buffy frozen in place.</p>
<p>“Spike, no,” Angel groaned. “Why?”</p>
<p>Spike didn’t look up from Lucy’s face when he replied. “You know why. Got your soul back, have you? Thought I smelled magic. Bit too late to regret what you’ve done.”</p>
<p>Lucy made a small sound and Buffy was finally able to move. She crossed the space between her and Lucy and sent Spike flying into the opposite wall with a kick to his chest. She dropped to the floor at Lucy’s side. Her cousin’s mouth was stained red.</p>
<p>“Lucy?” Buffy said.</p>
<p>Lucy blinked at her and whimpered. Her breath hitched.</p>
<p>“Hey, you’re gonna be okay. We’ll get you to the hospital, you’ll be okay.” Buffy reached out to hold Lucy’s hand but quickly drew her own hand back when she saw that Lucy’s hand had a lot of obvious broken bones. “It’s okay.”</p>
<p>Lucy blinked again.</p>
<p>“Buffy,” Angel said, “it’s too late.”</p>
<p>“No, it isn’t,” Buffy snapped. Her vision grew blurry. She blinked rapidly. Tears ran down her cheeks.</p>
<p>Lucy wasn’t breathing. Her eyes stared blankly at the ceiling. Buffy brushed her hand over Lucy’s face and closed her eyes.</p>
<p>Across the room, Spike got to his feet. Buffy zeroed in on the movement. Her instincts were screaming at her to turn him to dust, but she didn’t get up. Once she staked him there would be one more vampire in the room that she would have to slay, and she didn’t want to do that yet.</p>
<p>A heavy sigh cemented her certainty that Angel was all soulful again. “Spike, go home.”</p>
<p>“But—” Spike said.</p>
<p>“Now.” Angel didn’t growl or raise his voice, but his tone made it clear that he expected Spike to follow his orders.</p>
<p>Spike stood very still, watching them. “I’m taking Lucy with me.”</p>
<p>“No,” Angel said. “You’ve done enough damage.”</p>
<p>Spike still didn’t move. “You’re going to kill her. She wanted it, in the end. Said she wasn’t done yet.”</p>
<p>Buffy’s stomach did a few dozen cartwheels. She looked down at Lucy’s face. Would she really have chosen to become a vampire? She was terrified of the idea of losing her soul.</p>
<p>“We’re not going to kill her.” Buffy look over her shoulder and saw that Angel looked completely serious. He was even glaring at Spike a little. “Go home.”</p>
<p>Spike backed away from Angel, but he didn’t stop protesting. “I promised I’d stay with her.”</p>
<p>The two vampires stayed locked in their stand-off for a few more seconds. Then Angel sighed. “Fine, you can stay until she wakes up. And you walk in front of us.”</p>
<p>Angel covered Lucy with his jacket before picking her up. Cradled in his arms, Lucy looked almost like she was sleeping.</p>
<p>“Where we going?” Spike asked.</p>
<p>“My place,” Angel said.</p>
<p>Spike walked ahead of Buffy and Angel, looking over his shoulder frequently like he was checking that they were still there. Buffy lagged behind to put some distance between them.</p>
<p>“What are you doing?” she whispered to Angel when she was sure they were far enough away that Spike couldn’t hear.</p>
<p>Angel looked down at the burden he was carrying. “Fixing this.”</p>
<hr/>
<p>It took three days for Lucy to wake up. Buffy was at Angel’s apartment every day when she wasn’t patrolling or at school. She would have skipped school if Mom would let her get away with it. She didn’t, even though Mom knew about Spike turning Lucy into a vampire. Buffy had only told her and Giles about that. Willow, Ms. Calendar and Xander were distracted enough by Willow’s successful resouling of Angel that they bought the story of Lucy needing quiet time to recover from Angelus kidnapping her.</p>
<p>Giles was the only one Buffy had told Angel’s plan. Angel’s totally crazy, absolutely ridiculous, desperate plan that Lucy would probably have approved of if she’d had a say. If it worked then Buffy wouldn’t have to destroy what was left of her cousin.</p>
<p>When Lucy opened her eyes, Buffy was sitting at the end of Angel’s bed with one eye on her cousin and the other on Spike, who seemingly hadn’t moved from the corner of the room he was standing in since Wednesday. Buffy nearly missed the fluttering eyelids, but she jumped to her feet as soon as Lucy moved her head. Spike appeared at Lucy’s side before she could decide if she was going to get closer or not.</p>
<p>“Easy, luv,” Spike murmured. “Take it slow. Don’t want the Slayer to get spooked.”</p>
<p>Buffy winced when Lucy sat up and she saw her game face. Lucy rubbed her eyes on the sleeve of the pajamas Buffy had dressed her in. Then she held her hands up in front of her and studied them for several seconds. They were unbroken. All her injuries had healed.</p>
<p>“Spike,” Lucy said, “I’m hungry.”</p>
  </div></div>
<a name="section0023"><h2>23. I Only Have Eyes For You</h2></a>
<div class="story"><div class="fff_chapter_notes fff_head_notes"><b>Notes for the Chapter:</b><blockquote class="userstuff"><p>This chapter contains mentions of gun violence and suicide.</p></blockquote></div><div class="userstuff module">
    
    <p>
  <strong>
    <em>Giles</em>
  </strong>
</p><p>Giles knocked on the door of Angel’s apartment. He fiddled with his glasses and tapped the cross he was holding against his thigh while he waited. From Buffy and Angel’s reports, the demon inhabiting Lucy’s body seemed to be adapting well to Angel’s training regimen, but he didn’t want to be unprepared in case he needed to defend himself from it.</p><p>“Hi, Giles,” Angel said. “What brings you here?”</p><p>Giles hesitated for a moment to choose his words. “Buffy told me that you were up to having visitors.”</p><p>Angel nodded and opened the door wider so that Giles could go inside. “Tea?”</p><p>“Please.” Giles’s gaze darted around the room as he stepped inside. Several paintings hung on one wall around a desk. There were windows covered by thick curtains on the other side of the room. The furniture was well-worn, likely second hand. Giles noted that there wasn’t anything highly breakable lying around.</p><p>Angel crossed the room to the small kitchenette that wasn’t much more than a refrigerator and a hot plate and started making tea. Giles stood in the middle of the room, still looking around. He didn’t see the second vampire he’d expected to be there.</p><p>Giles looked at Angel. “Where is...?”</p><p>“Lucy’s still sleeping.” Angel opened the refrigerator and took out the carton of milk that was sitting next to plastic containers filled with blood. “It’s kind of early for us.”</p><p>“Ah, yes, of course. My apologies.” Giles accepted the mug of tea from Angel and took a sip. It was far too weak, nearly composed solely of hot water and milk. He supposed he should have expected that from someone who had no need to prepare food and drink on a regular basis.</p><p>Angel shrugged. “No worries.” He reached back into the refrigerator and took out one of the containers of blood. “Do you mind if I...?”</p><p>Giles shook his head. He hadn’t been raised to impose on a friend’s hospitality and deny them the comfort of their own home, even if said friend was a vampire and was less a friend then a tenuous ally. Angel poured some of the blood into a mug and put the container back in the refrigerator. He sat down on the couch. After a few seconds of hesitation, Giles sat in the patched armchair next to it. He still had a good view of the rest of the room from there.</p><p>Angel pushed the blanket and pillow on the couch out of his way. “It’s cow blood. I don’t get human blood anymore.”</p><p>“Yes, Buffy did mention that.” Giles took another sip of his milk and water.</p><p>The next few minutes were occupied by an awkward silence until a door on the other side of the kitchen opened and Lucy’s body walked into the room, yawning.</p><p>“Hi, Giles,” the demon said.</p><p>“Hello.” Giles watched the fledgling vampire take the half-empty container of blood out of the refrigerator and drink out of it without bothering with a mug. He looked away when the demon turned its yellow eyes on him.</p><p>The demon tilted Lucy’s head. “Your heart’s racing.”</p><p>“Lucy,” Angel said, with a tone of admonishment.</p><p>“Sorry.” The demon didn’t sound sorry. It swallowed another mouthful of blood. “How am I supposed to practice what not to say if you won’t let me out of the apartment?”</p><p>Angel sighed. Giles got the sense that they’d had this conversation many times before.</p><p>“How are you feeling?” Giles asked.</p><p>The demon smiled at him, which with its bloodstained teeth was more than a little unsettling. “Good. Strong.”</p><p>That was to be expected.</p><p>“Come sit down, Lucy,” Angel said. “You’re making Giles nervous.”</p><p>“Why do you get to say it but I don’t?” The fledgling sat next to Angel on the couch and put Lucy’s feet up on the coffee table. It was wearing bunny slippers. “Note that was a token complaint as well as a rhetorical question.”</p><p>A brief smile crossed Angel’s face. “Noted.”</p><p>The two vampires drank their blood while Giles finished his milk and water. He would have tried to make small talk, but what exactly did one do for small talk with a vampire who was a month out from regaining his soul and the demon inhabiting the body of his last victim? Talking about books would have been an option, but Giles didn’t think he could stand to see the demon pretending to have Lucy’s interests.</p><p>The demon swallowed the last of the blood in its container and put the mask of Lucy’s face back on. “So, why are you here, Giles?”</p><p>Giles froze. “Whatever do you mean?”</p><p>The demon sighed. “I know I can’t be trusted. I’m used to that. But I’m not going to kill you.”</p><p>“You’ll forgive me if I don’t take your word for that.” Giles’s fingers tightened around his cross. The demon flicked Lucy’s eyes towards the small movement and took in the cross for a second before looking back at Giles. He wondered if it was reading his mind. Would it have access to the powers that Lucy had forced upon her now that it had stolen her body?</p><p>“So that’s how it is.” The demon took Lucy’s feet off the table. “I’m still not going to kill you. You’re the only real dad Buffy’s got.”</p><p>The demon jumped up and disappeared back into the bedroom before Giles could respond. The empty blood container rattled in the sink where the demon had thrown it.</p><p>Angel stood up. “You should go, Giles. Thanks for stopping by.”</p><p>The sound of something heavy hitting the wall followed Giles out the door.</p>
<hr/><p>When Buffy entered the library, Giles was reshelving the last of the books they had been using to research Angelus.</p><p>“Morning, Giles,” Buffy said. “I come bearing cookies.”</p><p>Giles looked up from the book he was flipping through to see if it belonged in the history section or the demonology section. “Good morning, Buffy. Cookies?”</p><p>Buffy held up a plastic bag filled with what looked like chocolate biscuits. “They’re from Lucy. She said to be sure to tell you that I was there while she was making them.” She narrowed her eyes at Giles. “Any idea why?”</p><p>Giles adjusted his glasses. He shelved the book he was holding in history and went over to the table to collect the last stack of books there. “She may have gotten the idea that I am of the opinion she will attempt to kill us all.”</p><p>“Giles!”</p><p>Giles shook his head. “I’m afraid I didn’t have the opportunity to dissuade her.” And the demon wasn’t entirely wrong.</p><p>Buffy pouted. “Giles, you promised you’d help.”</p><p>He had, though not in so many words. Angel thought that they could teach the demon to have morals. The idea of helping a soulless vampire integrate into society made Giles feel very uncomfortable, but Buffy had asked.</p><p>“I assure you, you have my support.” He put another book back on its shelf. “Have you told your mother?”</p><p>“I’ve been planning to,” Buffy said. “Oh, look, Lucy wrote you a letter.”</p><p>Giles turned around as Buffy was disappearing out the door. He shook his head and went to read the note Buffy had left on the table next to the bag of biscuits.</p><p>
  <em>Sorry</em>
</p><p>The sound of more commotion than usual in the hallway made Giles drop the note and hurry out of the library before he could begin to pointlessly examine the paper for more words. He interpreted the tableau of a girl standing frozen with a terrified expression on her face and Buffy and a boy on the floor as the end result of a flying tackle that had likely resulted in Buffy saving the girl’s life. Several people asking repeatedly where the gun had gone reinforced that conclusion.</p><p>Snyder swooped in out of nowhere, scattering the crowd that had formed. “Well, well, well.” He narrowed his eyes at Buffy. “Someone is in trouble.”</p><p>“Eep,” Willow said. Giles looked over and saw that she and Xander had arrived next to him sometime in the confusion. The three of them watched as Snyder marched Buffy away to his office.</p><p>“So, we’ve got a magical vanishing gun,” Xander said once the hallway was clear. “Does that say ‘Hellmouth’ to anyone else?”</p><p>“One hundred percent,” Willow agreed. “Research time?” She turned to go into the library. Then the bell rang and she squeaked before grabbing Xander’s arm and hurrying to class with a quick goodbye thrown over her shoulder.</p><p>Giles returned to the library. A vanishing gun. At any other school there would have simply been a student who snuck it into their bag or a stray foot that kicked it out of sight during the chaos.  At Sunnydale High, the Hellmouth was almost certainly involved. He’d look for information on magical weaponry first.</p><p>No one came into the library until lunch, which gave Giles more than enough time to rule out the five magical guns that had ever been created. He wasn’t surprised by the small number, gunpowder and magic didn’t mix well under most conditions, but he was surprised that none of them could turn invisible or be teleported. Those seemed to be useful properties for a weapon, in his opinion. He’d moved on to transforming weapons when Buffy, Willow, Oz and Xander came through the doors.</p><p>“Hi, Giles. Any luck?” Buffy asked.</p><p>Giles looked at the books spread out on the table in front of him. “Not as such.”</p><p>Willow sat down and reached for a book. “How can we help?”</p><p>“Not that one.” That was a book on fairly dark magic that Giles didn’t want anyone else handling. He handed Willow a different book. “Has anyone been hurt by this phenomena?”</p><p>“Nope,” Xander said. “Is anyone hungry?”</p><p>“Me.” Buffy hopped off of the checkout counter where she’d taken a seat. “We okay to get lunch, Giles? We’ll bring you guys sandwiches.”</p><p>“That would be appreciated, Buffy,” Giles said. “Thank you.”</p><p>Buffy and Xander went to get food while Giles, Willow and Oz kept researching. The library was quiet except for the rustling of pages. Then Willow gasped and Giles quickly looked up. She was staring at something on the table. Next to her, Oz’s usual stoic expression had turned slightly pensive.</p><p>“Giles, what’s this?” Willow held up a piece of paper for him to see. It was the note from Lucy. He’d forgotten to put it out of sight in his office.</p><p>“Giles, this is Lucy’s handwriting,” Willow said when he didn’t reply. “What does ‘sorry’ mean? Is Lucy okay? Because ‘sorry’ could mean a lot of bad things that would be bad for Lucy and bad for Buffy and bad for Buffy’s mom and bad for all of us!”</p><p>Giles jumped in before Willow could continue. “I went to visit last night and suggested that Lucy might think about returning to school. She disagreed and for some reason felt the need to apologize for our argument with biscuits.”</p><p>“Oh,” Willow said. “Is everything okay? I mean...Angelus.”</p><p>That did sum up a lot of their current problems rather succinctly. The longer summary would have three names: Spike, Drusilla and Lucy. Angelus was responsible for all of them.</p><p>“Everything will be alright,” Giles said. “Give it time.” He tried very hard to believe it.</p><p>They didn’t find anything helpful at lunch. Midway through the second half of the school day, Giles switched over to research on vampiric customs and ethics. There was very little information on the latter, vampires as a species tended not to be ethical, but there were several books concerning the customs and habits of vampires that he made a close study of. He already knew that fledglings tended to return to their body’s home and kill all members of their former family. It was hypothesized by some scholars that this was a way for the new vampire to permanently cut ties with any person who might be able to stop them from killing. If that was true, then the demon in Lucy’s body not having killed Buffy and Joyce could give Angel a leg-up when it came to training it.</p><p>Giles was reaching for another book when there was a faint bang that made the hairs on the back of his neck stand up. He knew what a gunshot sounded like. He was out the door and down the hall before the first screams started.</p><p>A small crowd of students emerging from class had formed around the body by the stairs in the courtyard. Giles wove through them and saw Cordelia and Xander kneeling next to the body of a red-haired girl. His breath caught in his throat.</p><p>Xander looked up and caught his eye. “It’s Aphrodesia,” he said in a low voice.</p><p>When Giles got closer he saw that Xander was right. It wasn’t Willow lying there with a bullet in her heart. Cordelia let out a single sob.</p><p>That was when they heard the second shot.</p>
<hr/><p>“I don’t get it,” Buffy said. “Mr. Charles wasn’t even Aphrodesia’s teacher. Why would he kill her and then shoot himself in the music room?”</p><p>“And where did the gun go?” Sam asked.</p><p>Everyone was gathered in the library. Willow, Oz, Xander and Cordelia were sitting around the table while Sam and Soul took up space on the checkout counter. Jenny was behind the computer looking for something online. Giles was looking for books that could be useful in this situation. Buffy and Devon were pacing.</p><p>Giles took another book off its shelf, looked at the first page and put it back. Shapeshifters, while fascinating, were not relevant to a murder-suicide committed with a vanishing firearm.</p><p>“Maybe he was possessed,” Xander suggested.</p><p>“That still doesn’t tell us where the gun went.” Willow picked up one of the books Giles had left on the table and started flipping through it.</p><p>“I know where the gun went,” Jenny said. Giles looked over the bookcase and saw her staring at the computer screen with wide eyes.</p><p>Devon froze. “Where?”</p><p>“Wolf,” Soul said. He blushed. “Sorry. Joke reflex.”</p><p>They all ignored the boy’s slip and turned to learn what Jenny had found.</p><p>“It’s a spirit gift,” Jenny said. “They’re physical objects created by ghosts that dissolve into ectoplasm. I’ve got two mediums, a psychic and a necromancer online who’ve had experience with them. They’re divided on what type of ghost we’ve got though.”</p><p>“The murdery type?” Buffy suggested sarcastically.</p><p>“Does it matter?” Cordelia asked. “Can we kill it without knowing what it is?”</p><p>The children turned to Giles. He fiercely wished he could give them a better answer, but that wasn’t possible with the knowledge he possessed.</p><p>“Dealing with ghosts is a delicate matter,” he said. “Using the wrong banishment could only serve to anger the spirit or to give it more power. Unless one of you happens to be a necromancer?” Stranger things had happened.</p><p>The children all shook their heads. “Fresh out of necromancering,” Xander said. “Research party?”</p><p>Giles responded by handing him a ghost encyclopedia.</p><p>After several minutes of page turning and key tapping, Cordelia stood and announced that someone should go ask their classmates what they’d seen so that they could stop researching blindly. She drafted Xander and Devon to help her. Giles wished them luck and reminded them to avoid the police if any of them were still around, which was highly unlikely but stranger things had happened.</p><p>Devon got back first. “I talked to Scott and Pete. They heard Mr. Charles tell Aphrodesia to tell him that she didn’t love him, and then he said ‘don’t walk away from me, bitch’, and then he shot her.”</p><p>Giles raised his eyebrows. If it weren’t for the vanishing gun, Devon’s report would have made him certain that Robert Charles and Aphrodesia had been having an affair that ended horribly. Cordelia also brought back news of the rumour Harmony had been trying to spread about Robert and Aphrodesia having an affair that Aphrodesia tried to end.</p><p>“Like there’d be a student-teacher romance going on without me knowing about it.” Cordelia scoffed. “I shut her down.”</p><p>Giles politely ignored the hitch in Cordelia’s voice and no one else drew attention to it either, likely out of self-preservation.</p><p>“Great,” Buffy said. “Anything that doesn’t make me feel like we’re wasting our time looking for ghosts?”</p><p>“Oh, they’re definitely ghosts,” Cordelia said. “Amy saw Mr. Charles get possessed and that freak Michael saw it happen to Aphrodesia.”</p><p>So there were at least two ghosts or one extremely powerful one that was able to possess multiple people at the same time. Giles doubted that they were dealing with the only one ghost option. No one had violently died in the school recently, before Robert and Aphrodesia.</p><p>There was a thud further into the stacks. The few conversations that had been going on went silent. Buffy grabbed a small axe from behind the checkout counter. Giles followed half a step behind her as they went to investigate the noise. They found nothing but a book lying on the floor.</p><p>“Should we be running?” Sam called.</p><p>“No, it’s just a book.” Buffy crouched down to pick it up. “Old yearbook,” she muttered. “I could have sworn there was someone back here.”</p><p>Giles silently agreed. There was something all too odd about the fallen yearbook. He hoped that there wasn’t a vampire hiding in the stacks again.</p><p>They went back to researching. Then Xander returned with the news of the police officers being chased out of the school by a flock of birds when they tried to move Robert’s body.</p><p>Jenny looked up from the computer. “That’s narrowed it down to poltergeists, dead witches, something called ‘rewinders’, or any combination of the three.”</p><p>“Progress,” Buffy said. “Rewinders?”</p><p>“Ghosts that repeat their death,” Jenny said, reading off of the computer screen. “In this case, by possessing people.”</p><p>That sounded a lot like what they were dealing with.</p><p>“Do they have any other names?” Giles asked. That would be important for cross-referencing.</p><p>Jenny, with the help of people online who she assured Giles were trustworthy, drew up a short list of names and descriptions used for the types of ghosts they would be looking for, with additional translations into Latin, French and Spanish. Giles took the list and went to work. He came up for air the next morning with a plan and a pressing need for caffeine.</p><p>“It’s terribly simple,” Giles said to Buffy, Willow and Xander after they’d arrived in the library. “A Willoughby Exorcism will allow us to summon the spirits and determine what it is they want.”</p><p>“There’s more than one type of exorcism?” Xander asked. “Are we going to have to crack an egg on my head again?”</p><p>Giles frowned. “No, no eggs. A Willoughby Exorcism has more in common with a séance than what would traditionally be called an exorcism. We will need at least six people. More would be better.”</p><p>Buffy, Willow and Xander looked at each other. “Giles, did you get any sleep last night?” Willow asked.</p><p>“Of course I did.” He’d taken a nap in his office that morning. That counted. “Why do you ask? This isn’t such an unreasonable plan.”</p><p>“Cause Buffy told you who the ghosts are.” Willow sounded apologetic. “At least, we think we know who they are. Buffy?”</p><p>Buffy opened the book she was holding, which Giles recognized as the yearbook that had startled them the day before. “James Stanley and Grace Newman. They’re the only ones who died in April. We figured if they’re replaying their deaths, well, it’s April.”</p><p>“And I did some research,” Willow added. “He killed her, murder-suicide, like Mr. Charles and Aphrodesia. And right before the Sadie Hawkins dance, like Mr. Charles and Aphrodesia. We haven’t had a Sadie Hawkins dance since then, and I think it might have been some sort of trigger.”</p><p>Giles looked at the yearbook. That was a logical conclusion, assuming they were dealing with rewinders. He also vaguely remembered a family of witches called Newman.</p><p>“We can still do the Willoughby Exorcism, because we don’t know what they want, and we don’t know for sure it’s James and Grace,” Willow said. “Oh, but we don’t have enough people. The band’s playing tonight and Cordelia’s mom took her to a spa retreat to relax, because of Aphrodesia. But Ms. Calendar will help, won’t she? So we need one more person.”</p><p>A strange look crossed Buffy’s face. “Hey, Giles? Does this spell say anything about the people doing it having to be human?”</p>
<hr/><p>Xander was tapping his pencil on the table. He’d been tapping his pencil on the table since school was let out early on account of snakes in the cafeteria. It had begun to grate on Giles’s nerves shortly after. That had been more than an hour ago.</p><p>“Would you stop that?” Giles exclaimed when Xander paused his incessant tapping only to start up a new rhythm a second later.</p><p>Xander dropped the pencil. It clattered to a stop on the tabletop. “Does anyone want to tell me why we’re working with a guy who wanted to kill all of us a few weeks ago?”</p><p>Willow looked up from her book. “Angel has a soul again, mister. Or do you think I didn’t do a good job?”</p><p>While Xander was stuttering out a defence, the telephone rang. Giles picked it up. “Hello?”</p><p><em>“Giles,”</em> Angel said. <em>“Buffy told us what’s going on, with the ghosts. What time do you want us there?”</em></p><p>“Are you sure that’s wise?” Giles asked. They needed six people for the spell, that wasn’t up for debate, but he personally thought that bringing in anyone else would be safer.</p><p><em>“Lucy’s up for it and I think she’s ready.” </em>Angel paused for a moment and Giles heard a feminine voice speaking in the background. <em>“Is tonight good, around sunset, or do we need to move sooner?”</em></p><p>“Tonight will be fine,” Giles said. “I’ll call you if anything changes.”</p><p>Xander looked hopeful when Giles hung up the phone. “Was that Buffy’s mom? Or Amy? Or literally anyone other than Deadboy?”</p><p>Giles took off his glasses. “That was Lucy. She’ll be joining us tonight.”</p><p>Willow and Xander let out exclamations that quickly devolved into an argument. Giles tried to follow it but was lost when the topic went from Lucy to Cordelia. He cleaned his glasses and waited for the arguing to die down. When it didn’t, he sat back down, picked up his book and made a mental note to find a book about helping teenagers to deal with stress. Maybe Willow’s mother had written one.</p><p>Soon after, Giles decided to begin the preparations for the Willoughby Exorcism. The best place to do it would have been the music room as at least one of the spirits seemed to have some affinity for it. However, the risk of them being interrupted would be higher. No one went to the library unless they really needed help, except for Snyder when he wanted to get them into trouble, but Giles wouldn’t put it past someone to break into the music room for the fun of it now that Robert’s body had been removed. There was also the chance that Robert’s ghost would show up and cause everything to devolve into chaos. Violent death did tend to have that effect.</p><p>Giles sketched out a circle on the floor in chalk. It would be standing in for the round table that they didn’t have. Two white pillar candles were placed in the centre of the circle to draw in the spirits, like moths to a flame, as it were. Then he had to purify the space, which would normally be done with holy water but as they would have two vampires involved Giles substituted the rosewater that had been used in the spell as it was originally recorded. It wouldn’t provide the extra protection that holy water conferred, but the circle itself was supposed to be protection enough as long as it wasn’t broken.</p><p>Buffy and Jenny entered the library together while Giles was touching up the circle. Buffy immediately joined Willow and Xander while Jenny stopped at Giles’s side.      </p><p>“Buffy told me what’s going on. Are we ready?” Jenny asked.</p><p>Giles straightened his back and rolled his stiffening shoulders. “Almost. We’re waiting on the final members of our circle.”</p><p>Jenny frowned. “Are you sure that including Lucy and Angel is a good idea? Maybe one of them, but with both the recent torture alone could...get the attention of things we don’t want to be noticed by.”</p><p>“I’ve gone over all records pertaining to this spell,” Giles said. “It’s most visible to human ghosts and becomes less and less attractive the more demonic or angelic a being is. The creatures you’re referring to should pay us no mind.” The key word being “should”. Giles rapped his knuckles on the wooden table.</p><p>Jenny let out a breathy, nervous laugh. “Let’s hope we don’t find out.”</p><p>They spent the wait until sunset going over the spell, only putting the books away when the pizza they’d ordered arrived. Night fell while they were eating. It was easy to see that Buffy, Willow and Xander were getting impatient. Giles didn’t blame them. These ghosts had killed two people, and at the moment they were prime targets.</p><p>The library door opened. All five of them turned towards it and watched Angel step halfway through the doorway.</p><p>“Oh, great,” Xander said. “Deadboy’s here.”</p><p>“Xander,” Buffy said warningly. Xander mimed zipping his lips shut.</p><p>Angel turned to the hallway for a moment before facing them again. “Give us a second.” He disappeared into the hall.</p><p>“‘Us’?” Willow asked. “I mean, Lucy’s not here yet but it would be kind of weird for her and Angel to show up together because I think it takes longer than two months to get over being kidnapped but I’m not Lucy and none of us went to get her so she must have come with Angel.”</p><p>The door opened again and Angel walked into the library with Lucy hiding behind him. Giles almost didn’t see her at first. She would have looked small even without the oversized jumper she was wearing and she shied away from the rest of the room. It took Giles a moment to reconcile the frightened-looking girl with the demon he had seen on Monday night, but he managed. It was a struggle, but he managed.</p><p>Willow gave a little wave. “Hi.”</p><p>The demon flicked Lucy’s eyes upward for a second before looking back at the floor.</p><p>Giles cleared his throat. “Shall we get started?”</p><p>The process of casting the spell was straightforward. They all sat in a circle around their chalk tabletop and held hands. Then Giles lit the candles and invited the spirits to join them after he’d returned to his place in the circle. It really was remarkably like a séance. By all accounts, the woman who’d invented it in 1876, Lady Violet Willoughby, had been a powerful necromancer and medium who had a knack for handling troublesome spirits. By some accounts, she’d developed the exorcism so that people would stop calling her to deal with ghost dogs that kept knocking over chairs and ghost cats that chased living mice down the halls.</p><p>“Spirits, if you are among us, make yourselves known,” Giles said. At this point, any ghosts that had been drawn to them were supposed to become visible to the entire circle.</p><p>“I’m not seeing anything different,” Xander whispered. Willow shushed him.</p><p>“Spirits, make yourselves known,” Giles said again, more firmly. “Name thy name.”</p><p>Lucy’s body was sitting directly across the circle from Giles, in between Buffy and Angel. The second Giles finished speaking, Lucy’s head was raised. Her eyes reflected the candlelight.</p><p>“Grace Elizabeth Newman,” Lucy said.</p><p>Xander’s grip on Giles’s hand tightened. “James Stanley,” he ground out.</p><p>Well, that was one way of becoming visible.</p><p> “Grace Elizabeth Newman and James Stanley,” Jenny said. “We need to speak with you. Why have you been in our school?”</p><p>“I killed you,” James said through Xander. Giles looked at them out of the corner of his eye and saw that James had Xander’s gaze fixed on Lucy’s body.</p><p>“I lied,” Grace said. “I never stopped loving you.”</p><p>So the rumours about a student-teacher relationship were true, in a sense, just forty-three years out of date.  </p><p>“Can you ever forgive me?” James asked.</p><p>“Always,” Grace said.</p><p>Before the ghosts left Xander and Lucy’s bodies, Grace focused on Giles. “Thank you,” she said. Giles inclined his head in acknowledgement.</p><p>Grace and James came together in an embrace in the centre of the circle. In a blink they had vanished. The candles went out.</p><p>“Be at peace,” Jenny said.</p><p>“Be at peace and rest,” Giles said. He released Jenny’s and Xander’s hands, breaking the circle.  </p><p>Xander stood up and backed away from the chalk on the floor, rubbing his arms like he was cold. “First possession this year,” he muttered. “Yay.”</p><p>“He loved her,” Lucy said. “She loved him.”</p><p>“Hey, how are you feeling, Lucy?” Willow asked.</p><p>Lucy frowned. “Hungry.”</p><p>Angel and Giles shared split-second looks of panic before Buffy said that there was pizza left and Lucy’s only response was to ask if there was Hawaiian. The four teenagers descended on the leftovers like the proverbial swarm of locusts, polishing off what was left of the pizza in the time it took for Giles, Jenny and Angel to clean up. Giles had to hope that he could ignore his growling stomach until he got home. Even simple magic took energy.</p><p>As they were leaving the building, Giles heard Willow ask, “So, when are you coming back to school?”</p><p>“I don’t know,” Lucy said. “I don’t think I can.”</p><p>“What?” Willow exclaimed. “But, but, you have to! You’re graduating! You got accepted to NYU but they won’t take you if you don’t graduate!”</p><p>“I got accepted to UCLA and UC Sunnydale too. It’s...” Giles looked back and saw Lucy shrug. It would be a little difficult to go to school when exposure to sunlight would result in combustion.</p><p>Angel opened the door, took one look outside and immediately pulled the door shut. He looked at Giles. “Spike and Drusilla are sitting on your car.”</p><p>Giles didn’t know why he was surprised.</p>
  </div><div class="fff_chapter_notes fff_foot_notes"><b>Notes for the Chapter:</b><blockquote class="userstuff">
          <p>I would like to note that I know nothing about US college admissions. Lucy's college application experience is based on what happened on the show and the stuff I could Google.</p>
        </blockquote></div></div>
<a name="section0024"><h2>24. Unchained</h2></a>
<div class="story"><div class="userstuff module">
    
    <p>
  <strong>
    <em>Spike</em>
  </strong>
</p>
<p>“They’re late,” Drusilla complained. She tapped her nails on the hood of the Watcher’s car and watched the school with the intensity of a fox hunting a rabbit. Spike leaned against the car next to her. Peaches, the Watcher and whoever else they had with them hadn’t poked their heads out of the building in more than five minutes, at the door nearest to them or anywhere else. They’d likely retreated back into the sanctum sanctorum of the high school library. Drusilla, however, insisted on waiting.</p>
<p>“We could have a hunt, pet,” Spike tried. “You like that.”</p>
<p>Drusilla shook her head. “They’ll come to us. They’ve been invited.”</p>
<p>Spike sighed. “Right.” More waiting then. Not like that was something he was unfamiliar with as of late, but he was bloody tired of it.</p>
<p>The door nearest to the parking lot finally opened again. Angel and the Slayer walked towards them.</p>
<p>“About time,” Spike said. “We’ve been here for ages.”</p>
<p>The Slayer glared at him. “And now it’s time to leave.”</p>
<p>“No, no, no.” Drusilla jumped down from the car and landed lightly on her feet. “We’ll not leave ‘til we can have pie.”</p>
<p>The Slayer looked as if she might try to tear them apart with her bare hands. Some thanks that was for helping her get her boyfriend back.</p>
<p>“Apple first,” Drusilla said. “Apple pie, then cherry, then apple again. Would you like that, Spike?”</p>
<p>Spike pressed a kiss to Drusilla’s cheek. “Absolutely, my sweet.”</p>
<p>The Slayer and Angel looked at each other. The night was silent for a moment before the faint whining of a siren began.</p>
<p>“What do you want?” Angel asked.</p>
<p>“You know what we want,” Spike said.</p>
<p>Angel bared his teeth. “Lucy is mine, William.”</p>
<p>Spike growled. Like hell Lucy was Angel’s. Spike was her sire, she was his.  </p>
<p>“God, can you not?” the Slayer said. “I don’t know what’s worse, the testosterone poisoning or the treating people like trading cards.”</p>
<p>There was a slight tugging in his chest and Spike fought to keep a grin from splitting his face.</p>
<p>“I vote trading cards,” Lucy said. “That’s really dehumanizing.”</p>
<p>The looks on the Slayer’s and Angel’s faces were too perfect. Spike couldn’t stop himself from laughing.</p>
<p>Lucy walked towards them, clutching a book to her chest with one arm. She stopped next to Spike, smirked, and turned to face Angel and the Slayer. “Then again, none of us are really human here, are we?”</p>
<p>“You were supposed to stay with Giles,” the Slayer said.</p>
<p>In almost the same second, Angel demanded, “What did you do?”</p>
<p>Lucy tossed the book she was holding at the Slayer, who caught it before it could hit her in the face. “A little bibbidi-bobbidi-boo. I knocked them out. Page one hundred ninety-five. I might have put a little too much power into it. You should probably check that they’re still breathing.”</p>
<p>The Slayer clenched her jaw. Her gaze jumped from Lucy to Angel and back. “You need to be gone by the time everyone’s awake,” she said in a low voice.</p>
<p>Spike held up one hand. “Scout’s honour, Slayer.”</p>
<p>The Slayer glared at him again. Then she turned and marched back to the school. Angel didn’t follow her. Apparently the Slayer hadn’t gotten round to replacing the leash Angelus had slipped.</p>
<p>“Let’s go, Lucy,” Angel said.</p>
<p>“Nope.” A dazzling smile flashed across Lucy’s face before being smothered by a blank mask. “You’re not my sire. Did you really think I forgot about the whole torture thing?”</p>
<p>Angel didn’t say anything.</p>
<p>“You did,” Lucy said with a single, derisive laugh. “As much as you want to pretend it’s not true, you were there. That gets your friendship card revoked. Trying to be my sire? Not gonna happen.”</p>
<p>“Lucy, I...” Angel sighed. He looked at Spike. “Look after them.”</p>
<p>“Of course.” Spike bared his teeth in a cross between a snarl and a grin, both threatening. “Better than you ever could.”</p>
<p>Angel hesitated for a moment. Spike knew that Angelus would have proven his dominance after such an insult. He could practically feel Angel wrestling with the need to bash his face in, but of course the soul wouldn’t let him. After giving them one more sappy look, Angel turned and walked away.</p>
<p>Spike didn’t wait until Angel was gone before gathering Lucy into his arms and kissing her thoroughly. She clung to him so tightly that it seemed impossible that she would ever let go. Eventually she did, but only so that she could loop one arm around him and the other around Drusilla. The resulting group hug was entirely unbecoming of the master vampires of Sunnydale, but Spike didn’t care. They could just kill anyone who was watching anyway.</p>
<p>“What do we do now?” Lucy asked once they broke apart.</p>
<p>Spike grinned. “Whatever the bloody hell we want.”</p>
<p>Lucy looked shyly up at him through her eyelashes. “Well, Angelus certainly did a good job inflicting torture and trauma.” She looked him directly in the eye and smirked. “How can we top it?”</p>
<p>Spike had a few ideas.</p>
<p>Drusilla giggled and clapped her hands. “We’ll have such fun!” She joined hands with Spike and Lucy. “Come along, there’ll be no sweets if dinner catches us.”</p>
<p>Lucy made her first kill that night. It was a thing of beauty. She played the little lost girl and led a man into a blind alley where she set upon him with such ferocity that Spike heard bones breaking. She dropped the body a few moments after his last heart beat and smiled at Spike and Drusilla. Her mouth and chin were red with blood.</p>
<p>“Was that good?” Lucy asked. “Can I do it again?”</p>
<p>Spike kissed the blood from her lips. “As much as you want,” he promised. “Every night from now till forever.”</p>
<p>“My turn,” Drusilla said. She looked Lucy in the eye. “Which naughty little lamb will it be?”</p>
<p>Lucy gazed into Drusilla’s eyes for a few seconds. “The blonde in the green dress at the Bronze. The one with glasses.”</p>
<p>Spike raised an eyebrow. It sounded like...No. They couldn’t be choosing people out of Drusilla’s visions to kill. Could they?</p>
<p>Lucy looked at him with shining eyes. “Of course we are. Come on, Spike, let’s play.”</p>
<hr/>
<p>Spike rolled over. He opened his eyes when all he felt was empty sheets. Lucy had been joking about needing a bigger bed. He’d only not be touching her or Drusilla if both of them had already gotten up.</p>
<p>As he’d known they would be, Drusilla and Lucy were already awake. Drusilla was sitting in front of her vanity with her eyes closed so that Lucy could draw on her eyeliner. The girls had gone on a shopping trip the night before and both of them were wearing new outfits that left very little to the imagination. He took the time to admire the picture they made. The red ribbon lacing up the front of Drusilla’s dress was mirrored on the back of Lucy’s corset, eye-catching against the black garment. Drusilla had a matching ribbon in her hair.   </p>
<p>“Exciting plans for tonight?” Spike asked.</p>
<p>Lucy exchanged the eyeliner for a tube of lipstick. “We’re going to crash the swim team’s party. Do you want to come?”</p>
<p>Drusilla opened her eyes and looked at Spike for a second before her gaze drifted up towards the ceiling. “Sharks come out at night.”</p>
<p>“We’d best not go swimming then,” Spike said. He got out of bed and pulled on the T-shirt that had been thrown over the back of Drusilla’s chair. “Will we be having a massacre?” He could go for a good bit of slaughter.</p>
<p>Lucy looked thoughtful as she painted Drusilla’s lips a dark maroon colour. “Play it by ear?”</p>
<p>Spike smiled. “Sounds like a plan.”</p>
<p>Lucy finished Drusilla’s makeup with one last swipe of lipstick. Drusilla stood and smoothed her silky red dress. Then, without a word to Spike or Lucy, she disappeared up the stairs.</p>
<p>“Dalton’s brought breakfast,” Lucy murmured. “Drusilla’s claiming it. It won’t be enough for all of us.”</p>
<p>Spike plucked the lipstick tube from Lucy’s fingers. “Well, let’s get you all made up and you can get a bite on the way if you’re feeling peckish.”</p>
<p>“Sounds like a plan.” Lucy met his gaze briefly before looking away. “Spike...Do you love me?”</p>
<p>Spike was only surprised for a second, but a second seemed to be long enough for Lucy to catch it. Her face fell. Words didn’t feel like enough to fix that, so instead Spike thought as clearly as he could. He loved her. He was surprised that she’d had to ask. He loved her, differently from how he loved Drusilla, but still love. She was his, now and forever.</p>
<p>Lucy’s entire body relaxed. “I had a nightmare. You won’t leave me.”</p>
<p>“Never,” Spike promised. He chose a different tube of lipstick. “Come on, give us a smile.”</p>
<p>Lucy managed a small smile that Spike painted blood red.</p>
<p>They arrived at the party with much less blood than Spike expected. He and Lucy had barely been given time to drain a shopkeeper locking up for the night before Drusilla dragged them away and skipped giddily to the beach, where the party was already in full swing. Spike eyed the dark water, idly wondering if Drusilla’s words about sharks had been literal.</p>
<p>“Buffy and her friends are here,” Lucy said. Her eyes roved over the group of mostly teenagers. “Oh, there’s Devon! I’m going to go say hi. Don’t eat anyone.”</p>
<p>Drusilla took Spike’s hand as Lucy headed further down the beach. “Let’s dance, Spike.”</p>
<p>They moved closer to the boombox that someone was using to play an unfortunate pop song and joined the small group on the makeshift dance floor. Sand slid out from under their feet, turning the waltz that Drusilla had chosen into something that more closely resembled the dancing going on around them. They kept it going for a few songs and then Drusilla stopped and walked away in the middle of a step, leaving Spike to follow after her. They weaved between groups of people, most of who smelled well on their way to getting drunk. That could be something to look into later. It had been a while since Spike had alcohol with his blood.</p>
<p>On the other side of the party, Lucy was standing next to a familiar dark-haired boy wearing an unimpressive leather jacket and facing off against the Slayer and Red.  </p>
<p>“...embracing the Mistress of Pain look, huh?” the Slayer was saying.</p>
<p>“I like the new look,” the boy at Lucy’s side said. He turned to Lucy. “You’ve got a sort of goth aesthetic going. It works for you.”</p>
<p>Lucy smiled. “Thanks, Dev.”</p>
<p>Drusilla appeared at Lucy’s side and spoke softly in her ear. “Are you trying to make us jealous?”</p>
<p>Lucy looked at her. “Don’t you like being jealous?”</p>
<p>Drusilla leaned in to place a soft kiss on Lucy’s lips. “I like chains.”</p>
<p>“I don’t.” Lucy growled low in her throat. “Unless you’re offering to wear them.”</p>
<p>The Slayer and Red blushed.</p>
<p>Spike chuckled and went to join the party. He put his arms over Drusilla’s and Lucy’s shoulders. “Are you making plans without me?”</p>
<p>Lucy looked amused. “Don’t worry, you can watch.”</p>
<p>“Is anyone else uncomfortable? Because I’m uncomfortable, really, very uncomfortable. Like, <em>really</em> uncomfortable. How are you not uncomfortable?” Red’s last question was directed at Dev.</p>
<p>Dev shrugged. “I’ve had to deal with Soul talking dirty to Sam since they started dating. It’s funnier when Sam’s the only one blushing.”</p>
<p>Lucy laughed. “Good for Soul. And I know I’ve said it already, but it’s about time.”</p>
<p>“Yeah, those two...” Dev shook his head. “I guess it was worse for you because they were thinking about each other all the time, right?”</p>
<p>“About ninety percent of the time,” Lucy said.</p>
<p>The Slayer cleared her throat. “As interesting as this is, you,” she looked at Lucy, “need to leave before Xander gets back and tries to stake you.”</p>
<p>The Slayer actually seemed worried about that, though if the worry was for her friend or for Lucy, Spike couldn’t tell. He decided to concentrate on the only people there he cared about. The boy wouldn’t be a real threat, the Slayer would and she would defend her friends.</p>
<p>“Be seeing you then, Slayer,” Spike said. He and Drusilla walked away, with Lucy following after them after she’d said her goodbyes. “So, girls, where to next?”</p>
<p>Drusilla and Lucy looked at each other. “Well,” Lucy said. “We could go to UC Sunnydale and break up the little operation that Sunday chick has going on, assuming she doesn’t submit.”</p>
<p>Spike nodded. “Been meaning to do that.” Not that having absolute control over all the vampires in Sunnydale wouldn’t be useful, it was just going to be a lot of work to get started and there were other things that were so much more fun.</p>
<p>“Or we could go home and you can watch me and Dru take each other’s clothes off.” Lucy shot him a mischievous smile. “I’m sure we can make it as interesting as you’re imagining.”</p>
<p>Well, <em>that </em>was a lofty promise.</p>
<p>“Or we can do both,” Lucy said.</p>
<p>“Both?” Spike said. “Both.”</p>
<p>“Both is good,” Drusilla said. “All play and no work makes kittens lose stars.”</p>
<p>“I think you’re mixing metaphors, Dru.” Lucy ran a few steps ahead and then turned around to face them, bouncing on the balls of her feet. “Come on, nihilistic undead bitches aren’t going to break their own fingers.”</p>
<p>“Why do I get the feeling you’ve had more than the one run-in with Little Miss Sunshine?” Spike wondered aloud.</p>
<p>Lucy rolled her eyes. “Because I have. I so want to dust her, but she could be useful.”</p>
<p>Sunday did run a well-oiled operation, for a nihilistic undead bitch.</p>
<p>“You can play enforcer, kitten,” Spike said with a grin. “Try not to break her too much.”</p>
<p>They left Sunday minus one minion and plus two broken legs and other assorted injuries. It had taken a while to get through to her, but she’d finally agreed that it would be to her benefit to let Spike, Drusilla and Lucy have first pick of the loot her gang collected every September. The standard forty percent payout had been upped to sixty percent when Lucy had to get started on her legs. Sunday was tougher than the average suckhouse vamp. Her little gang was their first big gain since Spike had charbroiled the Annoying One.</p>
<hr/>
<p>When the Slayer marched into the factory the next night, Spike just sighed. He’d expected this to happen sooner or later when they’d decided not to pack up and move house. He’d lost that argument due to some definition of fairness that Drusilla and Lucy both agreed on and he wasn’t going to dwell on it. He put down the papers Lucy and Dalton were explaining to him and turned to face the Slayer head on.</p>
<p>“You do realize this is a private residence?” Spike asked sarcastically.</p>
<p>The Slayer scoffed. “You’re nesting in an abandoned warehouse.”</p>
<p>Spike crossed his arms. “And there’s no shortage of them, so you can scope out another for your Barbie dream home.”</p>
<p>“Okay, quip-fu match over. I’m calling it before you burn the building down,” Lucy said. She got up from the table and stood next to Spike. “We didn’t do anything to Dodd, Buffy. If it was a vampire that killed him, they weren’t one of ours. Also, skinning people? Not really a vampire thing.”</p>
<p>The Slayer blinked. “Do you mind-read people all the time now?”</p>
<p>Lucy nodded. “Pretty much, yeah.”</p>
<p>“That’s creepy,” the Slayer said.</p>
<p>It was useful, actually. Between Lucy and Drusilla there wasn’t much they wouldn’t know about.</p>
<p>Drusilla’s light steps came up behind them. She rested her chin on Spike’s shoulder and wrapped her arms around his waist. “Pretty little Slayer. Would you ever kill? Little sister would. You’ll have three.”</p>
<p>“I take it back,” the Slayer muttered. “You’re not the creepy one here.”</p>
<p>Spike growled at her and the Slayer shot a glare back at him. Drusilla giggled.</p>
<p>Lucy crossed her arms. “Was there anything else?”</p>
<p>“Only this.” The Slayer took a white and purple envelope out of her jacket and held it out towards Lucy. “Arrived today. Mom wanted me to give it to you.”</p>
<p>Lucy stepped close enough to the Slayer to pluck the envelope from her fingers before retreating. “Thanks.”</p>
<p>“You’re welcome,” the Slayer said.</p>
<p>A look that Spike couldn’t read passed between Lucy and the Slayer. Then the Slayer left the factory without another word. Spike turned his head to look at Lucy and saw that she was eyeing the envelope with trepidation.</p>
<p>“Who’s it from?” Spike asked.</p>
<p>Lucy made a squeaking sound before clearing her throat. “NYU. I already got my acceptance. I don’t know why they’re sending another letter.”</p>
<p>“That’s the school you’re so keen to go to, right?” When Lucy nodded, Spike said, “Well, open it.”</p>
<p>Lucy took a deep breath and slit the envelope open. Her eyes moved quickly, then slowly as she read the letter inside.</p>
<p>“Will we have cake?” Drusilla asked.</p>
<p>“I don’t know, Dru.” Lucy looked up from her letter. “They’re offering me a scholarship. It wouldn’t pay for everything, but...”</p>
<p>“But?” Spike prompted after she’d trailed off and showed no sign of speaking again any time soon.</p>
<p>“My parents would be proud.” Lucy shook her head and put the letter back in the envelope. “Never mind that. We have work to do. Dalton and I are going to prove that buying blood will increase manpower, and you are going to agree.”</p>
<p>Spike did agree, after several back and forth arguments, and he commented that Lucy had become awfully entrepreneurial as of late. Lucy muttered that everyone had to have a hobby before disappearing behind one of the books on blood magic that Spike had stolen while looking for a way to help Drusilla.</p>
<p>Later that night, when Drusilla and Lucy had gone out for a midnight snack, Spike sought out Dalton in the office he’d given him after Angelus had left. Dalton had been loyal during that entire episode and he’d deserved to be rewarded for it.</p>
<p>Dalton was sitting at his desk, absorbed in a book that looked like it might have been older than he was. He jumped when Spike cleared his throat. “Master Spike! How can I help you?”</p>
<p>Spike placed Lucy’s scholarship letter on the desk. “Do you know if this place has night classes?”</p>
<hr/>
<p>“Devon told me that the swim team was turning into fish people,” Lucy said.</p>
<p>Spike looked up from the book he was reading to the bed where Drusilla and Lucy were holding hands and had a daisy floating between them. Both of his girls had their eyes fixed on the flower. He didn’t know how Lucy was able to split her attention between magic and speaking without the daisy falling or bursting into flames, but he welcomed the conversation. Total silence in the factory during the day got boring.</p>
<p>“The Slayer stopped it, I suppose,” Spike said. “When did you see Dev?”</p>
<p>“Last night, when we were at the Bronze.” Lucy smiled. “You were flirting with dinner. B-positive?”</p>
<p>“O-positive.” Spike watched as the daisy became covered in a rime of ice and then slowly went clear and colourless. “Your boy does know you’re evil now?”</p>
<p>“He’s Devon,” Lucy said, as if that was enough of an answer. And for her it probably was. She did know the boy well.</p>
<p>“Hush,” Drusilla ordered. “Watch.”</p>
<p>The ice daisy spun slowly in the air. It rose above their heads, still spinning, and burst into a shower of fluffy snowflakes.</p>
<p>Lucy laughed. She and Drusilla came together in an embrace as they turned their faces upwards to watch the snowfall. Their eyes sparkled.</p>
<p>“It’s beautiful, Dru,” Lucy said.</p>
<p>Drusilla looked over at Spike and stretched a hand out towards him. The invitation was clear. Spike put down his book and went to join them.</p>
  </div><div class="fff_chapter_notes fff_foot_notes"><b>Notes for the Chapter:</b><blockquote class="userstuff">
          <p>I would like to reiterate that I know nothing about how US colleges work. Nothing.</p>
        </blockquote></div></div>
<a name="section0025"><h2>25. Becoming (Part 1)</h2></a>
<div class="story"><div class="userstuff module">
    
    <p>
  <strong>
    <em>Lucy</em>
  </strong>
</p>
<p>The bartender at the Shelter had come to know Lucy pretty well in the past few nights. Case in point, she had Lucy’s drink ready before Lucy even reached the bar.</p>
<p>“Drinking alone again?” The bartender grinned, her teeth startlingly white against the midnight blue of her skin.</p>
<p>Lucy smiled back. “Come on, Cinna. You know I’m plotting.”</p>
<p>Cinna laughed and pushed Lucy’s drink towards her, exchanging it for the bills that Lucy placed on the bar. “As long as you keep tipping, plot as much as you want. I’ve got kids to put through college.” Though she acted as if she were only joking, her thoughts showed concern. It proved that Cinna was too good for Sunnydale if she could worry about the well-being of a soulless monster.</p>
<p>Lucy toasted Cinna with her glass before the Mut’mayer woman turned away to take the orders of a Britzai couple. She sipped her O-positive with tequila (she was a vampire now, she wasn’t going to get carded at a demon establishment) and surveyed the club. The dance floor was half full. The band playing that night was an all-human punk rock group from L.A. whose music was loud enough that the more auditory-sensitive demons were nowhere to be seen. It was on the very edge of what vampire ears could tolerate. That band would likely never play at the Shelter again, but the noise was exactly what Lucy needed. It stopped her from thinking so damn much for a little while.</p>
<p>Another vampire started making his way towards her far more obviously than he thought he was. He was a short, stocky Black man (young looking, more like a teenager really) with short-cropped red hair dressed in something out of the seventies. Lucy followed his progress and continued sipping her drink.</p>
<p>The vampire ordered a drink, Scotch, and leaned against the bar. For a moment it seemed like he’d lost his nerve, then he asked, “What’s a pretty girl like you doing here all alone?” He’d been choosing between that and “Come here often?” The pick-up lines in this one.</p>
<p>Lucy sifted out of her demon face so she wouldn’t have to talk around her fangs. “I’m not alone now, am I?” She looked at the vampire over the rim of her glass. “What do I call you?”</p>
<p>The vampire smiled, picking up flirting in her tone where she intended sarcasm to be. “I’m Andy. Nice to meet you.”</p>
<p>“You’re new in town, aren’t you, Andy?” That, or his nose wasn’t working.</p>
<p>Andy confirmed that he was new to Sunnydale, had arrived the previous night in fact. Lucy nodded knowingly but didn’t say anything. In about ten seconds she wouldn’t have to, so she didn’t see the point in wasting her breath. Andy got twitchy after three seconds.</p>
<p>“How’d you know I’m the new guy?” he asked.</p>
<p>Lucy smiled and finished her drink. “Logic.”</p>
<p>When she wasn’t any more forthcoming, Andy growled. Lucy kept on smiling. The rule of three anti-violence spell on the club would stop him from trying anything, and if he was stupid enough to go after her later then he deserved whatever he got.</p>
<p>“Wait a few seconds,” Lucy said. “You’ll see what I mean.” The D-sharp cord echoing in her brain was loud enough that she felt confident in that estimate.</p>
<p>Andy gritted his teeth and swallowed half of his Scotch. He didn’t walk away though, so points for perseverance.  </p>
<p>Literal seconds later, the door at the main entry opened. Spike walked into the club and headed straight for the bar. Andy had his back to the door. Spike was a few feet behind him when Andy caught his scent and made the connection. Lucy held back a laugh.</p>
<p>“Fancy seeing you here,” Spike said. He walked around Andy to stand next to Lucy.</p>
<p>Lucy smiled at him. “I’m making friends. This is Andy. Andy, this is Spike.”</p>
<p>The look on Andy’s face was priceless. It was a hilarious cross between terror, awe and embarrassment that had his eyes nearly bulging out of his skull. If vampires could blush he would probably have been blushing.</p>
<p>“William the Bloody,” Andy said. He swallowed nervously. “Hey, man, I didn’t know she was your girl.”</p>
<p>Spike grinned. “What’s a little misunderstanding between friends?” His eyes flashed yellow for a split second. Andy flinched but held his ground.</p>
<p>“He’s new to town,” Lucy said. “No allegiances.”</p>
<p>Spike looked at her and raised an eyebrow.</p>
<p>“Dalton would find him tolerable,” she added.</p>
<p>Spike turned back to Andy. “Well, looks like you’ve got a job, assuming the missus is right about you having half a brain.”</p>
<p>At that Andy did take a step back. “I’d be honoured but, uh...” He glanced at Lucy and lowered his voice like that was going to stop her from hearing what he said. “I hear your girl’s pretty loco, and I like having all my limbs attached.”</p>
<p>Lucy bared her teeth and growled. “Don’t call me crazy.” Crazy was one degree from damaged, which was one degree from broken. Angel thought she was broken.</p>
<p>Spike narrowed his eyes at Andy. “See, now you really have no choice.” He put a hand on Lucy’s shoulder. “You don’t want to make my girl angry.”</p>
<p>Andy stuttered and choked, but he finally agreed to meet them at a given location (one of the suckhouses they owned) later that night. He wasn’t planning on running for the hills. He was terrified, but also he really wanted to work with William the Bloody. Once he’d bowed his way back to the other side of the room, Lucy slid off the bar stool and waved goodbye to Cinna. She and Spike got a block away from the club before Spike’s control slipped. Lucy had her back against a wall before she could blink.</p>
<p>“So, that’s where you’ve been disappearing to,” Spike said in a low voice. “You didn’t think that maybe I’d be worried one of the white hats got you?”</p>
<p>“You’d know if I was dust.” Lucy mentally plucked the bond between them and the fading cord sounded loudly in her mind. Spike pressed the hand that wasn’t holding her against the side of the building to his heart.</p>
<p>“Not the point,” he said.</p>
<p>Lucy rolled her eyes. “Buffy isn’t going to dust me. The others will follow her lead. They’re like sheep.” Well, except for the Dingoes. They were more like Buffy.</p>
<p>Spike sighed and let her go. She gave him a kiss that tasted like blood.</p>
<p>“I’ve been plotting,” she said. “I think I know how to torture Angel.”</p>
<p>Spike froze, staring at her. “Do you?”</p>
<p>Lucy nodded. “Yup. Want to help me talk Drusilla into it?”</p>
<p>He did. He really did.</p>
<hr/>
<p>Lucy’s plan was simple. It had only three steps. The problem was step one.</p>
<p>“We need to reduce the number of variables,” Dalton said. “Otherwise there’s too much of a risk something will go wrong.”</p>
<p>“But we’ll have more of an impact if we follow Angelus’s MO,” Lucy argued. She paused in her pacing to glare at Dalton across the table. He didn’t even flinch. “I want to hurt him, Dalton.”</p>
<p>Dalton nodded. “I understand, but we don’t want to make any mistakes. You’ve kept a low profile so far. That’ll change if you start leaving dead girls around Angel’s apartment.”</p>
<p>Lucy sighed. “Cunning like a fox?”</p>
<p>“Cunning like a fox,” Dalton agreed.</p>
<p>Lucy sighed again and sat down next to Dalton. “Okay, what was your idea?”</p>
<p>“A bait-and-switch with something a little less alive.” Dalton opened a book to the page he’d marked (with a bookmark of course, not by a method as barbaric as folding the corner of the page) and placed it in front of her. “There are several artifacts that could work for our purposes. One of the three Jade Monkeys, a piece of the Judge, the Sanderson Candle...”</p>
<p>Lucy read the description of each artifact Dalton pointed out. “Not one of the Monkeys. ‘Hear no evil, see no evil, speak no evil’ could cause problems for us. Any weapons could be used against us.” She thought about it for a bit before flipping back a few pages. She pointed to one of the entries. “That could work, but can we get it?”</p>
<p>“There’s ringing in my head,” Drusilla said. Lucy turned towards the door and saw Drusilla dancing and spinning as she crossed the factory floor while Spike followed behind her. “No, buzzing. Buzz, buzz, buzz.” She smiled and pecked Lucy’s forehead before drifting away.</p>
<p>Spike placed a blood-spotted newspaper on the table. “Dru thought you might like this.”</p>
<p>Lucy took one look at the paper and burst into delighted laughter. “Drusilla, you’re wondrous!” On the second page of the newspaper was exactly the artifact they were looking for. The stone sarcophagus holding the petrified Acathla had been dug up in the process of building low-rent housing (which seemed pointless since property values in Sunnydale were so low that someone could buy a house with a paperclip) and was now at the Sunnydale History Museum, waiting to be opened.       </p>
<p>“Ashes, ashes.” Drusilla shook her head. “Good boys and good girls go to hell. What shall we do?”</p>
<p>Lucy grinned. “Steal the portal.”</p>
<p>There wasn’t anyone at the museum when they arrived except for the night watchman and the curator in the room with the sarcophagus. Drusilla had the night watchman under her thrall in seconds and slit his throat with a flick of her fingers. The blood that spilled out smelled foul, like the watchman was rotting on the inside. All four of them had no trouble letting it bleed out onto the floor untasted. The curator was behind a locked door that Spike broke open with a kick.</p>
<p>The curator jumped to his feet as they entered the room, his heart racing. “You can’t be in here!”</p>
<p>Spike raised his eyebrows in cartoonish shock. “We can’t? So how are we already in the room, then?” He scoffed and dropped the exaggerated expression. “You hungry, kitten?”</p>
<p>Lucy stepped towards the panicked curator. “Starving. Do you mind if I don’t share?”</p>
<p>Spike waved her forward. “Dru and I already had lunch.”</p>
<p>The curator screamed when Lucy let her demonic face emerge. His screams quickly turned into gurgling when Lucy darted forward, threw him over the chair he’d jumped out of and crushed his trachea between her teeth. His blood was sweeter than any she’d had before, sticky, syrupy sweet. Maybe he was diabetic.</p>
<p>While Lucy finished her dessert-for-breakfast, Spike studied Acathla’s sarcophagus. “That’s a big rock. Can’t wait to tell the grandsire; he doesn’t have a rock this big.”</p>
<p>“It’s glittering,” Drusilla breathed. “You get us the best presents, Spike.”</p>
<p>Lucy dropped the curator’s body behind his desk. “Let’s figure out how to move it and get out of here. We probably set off some sort of alarm. Dalton, is that a trolley over there?”</p>
<p>Spike, Lucy and Dalton lifted the sarcophagus onto the trolley. Wheeling it out of the room was easy, finding a door that was large enough to get it out of the building without meeting a flight of stairs was harder. Lucy and Spike quickly lost patience.</p>
<p>“Screw this.” Lucy chose a side door that led to the parking lot. “It needs about another foot and a half. Spike, I need to touch the top of the door frame.” Spike obligingly wrapped his arms around Lucy’s waist and lifted her up the few extra feet she needed. She laid her palms against the concrete above the door. She’d practiced this. It was as easy as levitating a pencil, maybe so easy that it verged on dark magic. “<em>Celeritate interitus</em>.”</p>
<p>Thirty-six square inches of the wall turned to dust.</p>
<p>Spike placed her back on the ground. “Well then, how’d you manage that?”</p>
<p>“Everything eventually rots away. I sped it up a bit.” Lucy pushed the door open. “Can we get out?”</p>
<p>The sarcophagus fit easily through the expanded opening. Then it was a matter of loading it into the van and deciding where they would store it. Lucy had the perfect location in mind, but first they had to do something about the two police officers who’d drawn the short straws to investigate the museum’s alarm and seen them leaving the building.</p>
<p>Lucy’s stomach growled.</p>
  </div></div>
<a name="section0026"><h2>26. Becoming (Part 2)</h2></a>
<div class="story"><div class="userstuff module">
    
    <p>
  <strong>
    <em>Buffy</em>
  </strong>
</p>
<p>“Is anyone else worried about how we managed to lose a demon that can suck the world into hell?” Xander asked. “I mean, what does that say about us? We lost a giant stone demon that can suck the world into hell.”</p>
<p>“We didn’t lose it. It was stolen,” Willow pointed out. “Pass me that book over there.”</p>
<p>Xander reached across the table to pick up the book that Willow was pointing to and handed it to her.</p>
<p>“Thanks,” Willow said, and disappeared back behind the computer.</p>
<p>Buffy looked from her friends to the book open in front of her. It wasn’t in English and it wasn’t in Latin. She had no idea what it said. She turned in her chair to face Giles, who was sitting behind the checkout counter. “There’s no chance that Alfalfa got up and walked away on his own?”</p>
<p>Giles adjusted his glasses and answered without looking up from whatever he was reading. “No, not at all. Acathla can only be awoken by one who is worthy using the blood...oh dear lord.”</p>
<p>Buffy’s eyes widened. “What ‘oh dear lord’? Giles!”</p>
<p>Giles looked up. The shadows under his eyes seemed darker than they had been seconds before. “Using the blood of the eldest of an elder bloodline. The first person in Sunnydale to come to mind who fits that description is Angel.”</p>
<p>The library was silent. Of course it was Angel.</p>
<p>“Is anyone else really hoping that whoever stole our demon isn’t worthy?” Xander said. “We had enough trouble last time someone wanted to use Deadboy’s blood.”</p>
<p>Buffy wanted to argue, but Xander was right. Between the assassins, Kendra mistaking her for a vampire, and Willy selling her, Kendra and Angel out to Spike, burning the church down and dropping an organ on Spike didn’t feel like equal payback. If someone tried to kidnap Angel again, she was going to rip off their arm and beat them to death with it.</p>
<p>“I’m in the security footage!” Willow said. There was a scramble as Buffy, Xander and Giles hurried over to the computer to look at the screen over Willow’s shoulder.</p>
<p>A five by five grid of images covered the screen. None of them were changing except for the night watchman moving around and the curator Giles had spoken to leaving the room he was working in once to get a cup of coffee. Then, at one in the morning exactly according to the timestamp on the video, the watchman stopped walking in front of a case of old knives. He swayed slightly on the spot and then suddenly dropped to the floor with his throat cut. There wasn’t anyone in the frame with him.</p>
<p>“Oh no,” Willow said. “I think we have vampires.”</p>
<p>The double doors of the room where the curator was working violently burst open seemingly on their own.</p>
<p>“Definitely vampires,” Buffy agreed.   </p>
<p>There weren’t any cameras in the room. Buffy tried to watch through the open doorway but only managed to catch some flashes of movement before the giant stone block that held the demon was wheeled out of the room. She followed the stone until it was pushed out of the building via a door that had to be broken so that it would fit through.</p>
<p>“Well, that was useless,” Xander said.</p>
<p>“Not at all,” Giles disagreed. “We now know that Acathla was stolen solely by vampires.”</p>
<p>“Who could have been working for someone else,” Buffy pointed out. So the security footage was useless.</p>
<p>Willow sighed. “Darn. I was hoping that would show us who we’re dealing with.” She clicked away from the security footage to a page that looked like an online chatroom with a lot of pentagrams. “And still nothing from Ms. Calendar’s online coven. What’s a girl got to do to prove she’s not a satanic cannibal out to destroy the world?”</p>
<p>Buffy, Xander and Giles looked at each other with wide eyes.</p>
<p>“I beg your pardon?” Giles asked.</p>
<p>Willow blushed. “They’ve had problems with these radical Church of Darkness people...But I’m working on it. It’ll take a little longer than if Ms. Calendar was able to introduce me, which is something we should have done a while ago but we were always too busy and now we’re stuck with this.”</p>
<p>Giles made his way back to his seat behind the counter. “Someone had to go with Ms. Summers. Cleveland is quite unsafe this time of year.”</p>
<p>Buffy hadn’t been happy about Mom going on a business trip to the other Great American Hellmouth without her, but with the missing demon hellportal statue she needed to be in Sunnydale. Mom and Ms. Calendar were supposed to be back on Monday.</p>
<p>“I wonder if there are other elder bloodlines in Sunnydale,” Giles mused.</p>
<p>“I think I speak for all of us when I say, gee, I hope not,” Xander said.</p>
<p>“The Master’s bloodline is the only one,” Angel said.</p>
<p>Xander jumped a foot into the air. “Make some noise, would you?”</p>
<p>Angel didn’t reply. He walked further into the library and handed a few scraps of paper to Giles. “We know who has Acathla.”</p>
<p>“We do?” Buffy asked. She went over to the counter to see what Angel had given Giles. Giles quickly finished reading and relinquished the papers to her. They consisted of a picture of the stolen stone box that had been clipped out of a newspaper and a short note that read <em>Catch me if you can, Angelus.</em> The note was in Lucy’s handwriting.</p>
<p>“Why would they want Acathla?” Giles frowned. “I didn’t peg Spike for one who wants to end the world.”</p>
<p>“He wouldn’t be, unless Drusilla told him to,” Angel said.</p>
<p>That was something that was scarily easy to picture. Of course Spike would end the world if Drusilla wanted it. Hadn’t Lucy once said that he would do anything for his sire?</p>
<p>“So let’s go to the factory and destroy the thing!” Xander said. “We can destroy it, right?”</p>
<p>Giles picked up the book he’d been reading and turned a few pages. “It is possible to destroy Acathla, but it would require the twin of the sword first used against him wielded by, well, Angel, in this case. The Swords of Altaïr. I’ll make a call to the Council and see if they have the second in storage.”</p>
<p>“While you do that, Angel and I will go look for our demon,” Buffy said. It wouldn’t be sitting in the factory gift wrapped for them. Lucy was too smart for that.</p>
<hr/>
<p>Kendra arrived at Buffy’s house the next morning. Her Watcher had sent her to Sunnydale thanks to another premonition or whatever it was that made him put her on a plane to a Hellmouth by herself. Buffy surprised the other Slayer by giving her a hug before dragging her inside.</p>
<p>“Are things really so bad that both of us need to be here?” Buffy asked.</p>
<p>“My Watcher believes it to be so.” Kendra took a long bag off of her back and placed it on the dining room table. “He had me bring this.” She unzipped the bag to reveal the sword inside.</p>
<p>Buffy pursed her lips. “I’m guessing that’s the second Sword of All-ear.”</p>
<p>“Sword of Altaïr,” Kendra corrected. “Yes, it is.”</p>
<p> “Alright,” Buffy said. “I’ll call Giles. Do you want something to drink?”</p>
<p>When Giles arrived with Willow, Xander, Cordelia, Oz and the other three members of Dingoes Ate My Baby in tow, Buffy and Kendra were sipping cups of tea that Kendra had ended up making. She’d added spices that Buffy didn’t recognize, but it tasted good.</p>
<p>“Kendra brought the sword,” Buffy said.</p>
<p>“Wonderful. Were you and Angel successful in locating Acathla?” Giles took a sip of the tea he’d poured for himself and raised his eyebrows. “Chai, excellent.”</p>
<p>Buffy shook her head. They hadn’t found the demon or any of the vampires who’d stolen him. According to Angel, Drusilla had been moving all over town when he’d tried to track her. Lucy, Spike and Drusilla definitely had a plan.</p>
<p>“So, this demon is going to suck the world into hell if we don’t destroy it?” Sam asked. “And we don’t know where it is?”</p>
<p>“That pretty much sums it up,” Willow said. “I’ve finally gotten Miss Calendar’s online coven to trust me, but they can’t find him either. Apparently most demon tracking spells are pretty useless in Sunnydale.”</p>
<p>Considering that Sunnydale seemed to be ninety-nine percent demon on a good day, that limitation made perfect sense. </p>
<p>Xander cleared his throat. “You forgot one teeny tiny little thing.” He turned to Kendra. “Buffy’s cousin went to the dark side on us.”</p>
<p>Kendra looked confused. “I beg your pardon?”</p>
<p>“Lucy’s a vampire,” Buffy quickly explained, before Xander could say anything else.</p>
<p>An expression of understanding crossed Kendra’s face. “I am sorry for your loss.”</p>
<p>Buffy gave her a pained smile. “Thanks.” She didn’t try to explain that it didn’t feel like a loss, not really. It felt more like when Angel had lost his soul. Lucy was gone but she was still there, and it felt like her fault.</p>
<p>“Isn’t Lucy trying to send some sort of message or something?” Cordelia asked. “I mean, she sent you a note.”</p>
<p>“She sent Angel a note,” Buffy said. She frowned as she remembered something about that note that hadn’t seemed as important the night before. “She sent Angel a note, but she called him Angelus.”</p>
<p>Was that important? It could have been a way to taunt Angel. He hated Angelus, he hated being Angelus and he hated being reminded that he ever was Angelus. She could also have been telling him that he was soulless, metaphorically speaking. (Was that what a metaphor was? Buffy had fallen asleep in English class that day.)</p>
<p>Xander made a snide remark about vampires sending messages through dead bodies that made Devon jump to Lucy’s defence. Their verbal argument turned into a brawl in the middle of the living room between one word and the next. Before they could break anything or punch a hole in the wall, Buffy and Kendra pulled them apart.</p>
<p>“So not the time, boys,” Buffy said. “Giles, is there any kind of tracking spell we <em>can</em> use?”</p>
<p>Giles sighed. “I’ve not found anything in my research to track Acathla himself, but we may be able to use Angel to locate Spike and...the others.”</p>
<p>Willow and Kendra nodded along to the plan Giles laid out. Track Spike, Drusilla and Lucy during the day using Angel’s blood connection to them, go to their location, and have Angel destroy Acathla. It assumed that the three vampires didn’t want to leave the demon unguarded during off peak hours, and with the useless guards they’d had last time Buffy had been to the factory she was pretty sure that they’d be guarding the statue themselves. It seemed like a safe assumption.</p>
<p>“But what if they aren’t with the demon statue?” Sam asked. “Do we just keep looking and pray no one decides to end the world?”</p>
<p>Buffy grimaced. “Pretty much.”</p>
<hr/>
<p>The tracking spell that Giles had found involved Angel dripping his blood over a map of Sunnydale while Giles read some stuff in Latin. Two drops of blood flew so far to the east that they were off the map. Buffy saw one of them hit the library door. A small cluster of blood drops fell on the warehouse district, a few lone drops landed where Buffy was sure there were some abandon townhouses, and a second cluster marked the end of Crawford Street.</p>
<p>“They’ve been making minions,” Angel said. He pointed to the single drops of blood. “Those will all be minions. They wouldn’t keep Acathla in that part of town.”</p>
<p>Buffy didn’t get a chance to ask why Acathla wouldn’t be there before Kendra asked if they’d already searched in the area of the warehouse district where Angel’s blood had fallen. Buffy and Angel looked more closely at the map. They had looked around there, but they hadn’t gone into every building. The vampires Angel’s blood highlighted were in a warehouse not far from Spike, Drusilla and Lucy’s factory.</p>
<p>“We can split up,” Xander suggested. “Hit both locations tonight. A coordinated strike.”</p>
<p>“Great plan, except we only have one sword and one Angel,” Cordelia said. “We’d need some way to get Angel where he wasn’t if that was where Acathla was, and some way to tell him he wasn’t where he should be.”</p>
<p>The library was silent. Everyone who wasn’t Cordelia wore identical expressions of confusion.</p>
<p>Cordelia huffed and crossed her arms. “We’ll need radios and getaway cars. Xander, let’s go steal from the military again.” </p>
<p>“‘Again’?” Soul asked. “When did you steal from the military before?”</p>
<p>Giles took off his glasses and began cleaning them. “I am not hearing this.”</p>
<p>“Good,” Cordelia said. “Come on, Xander. Oz, you drive.”</p>
<p>Oz just raised his eyebrows before walking out of the library after Cordelia and Xander.</p>
<p>“Okay, so I guess we’re going with a coordinated strike,” Buffy said. “How are we organizing this?”</p>
<p>They decided on one Slayer and one magic person per group. Buffy introduced Kendra to the time-honoured tradition of flipping a coin to choose who went where. She lost the coin toss and Kendra, after a moment of indecision, picked Crawford Street as her target, leaving Buffy with the warehouse. Buffy was good with that. She felt like it made more sense for Acathla to be in the warehouse district. That was where all the vampires and demons set up shop, after all. Kendra may have gotten in more training than her, but the younger Slayer had only fought Spike once and she’d never had to go up against Drusilla or Lucy. Buffy had the experience in that area.</p>
<p>“Giles, you go with Kendra. Willow, you’re with me.” Buffy looked at Devon, Sam and Soul. “Can any of you guys drive?”</p>
<p>Devon and Soul could, Sam couldn’t. They decided to wait until Xander, Cordelia and Oz got back so they could be sure to have enough drivers for each group.</p>
<p>Their three thieves returned with a haul of four military radios and two flare guns. “This is all we could carry. Someone remind me to requisition a bunch of stuff so we don’t have to keep breaking in,” Xander said.</p>
<p>“I saw less breaking, more walking,” Oz said.</p>
<p>Xander shrugged before explaining how to use the radios. He kept one and the others went to Cordelia and Soul, who would be the getaway drivers, and to Oz, who would be on Buffy’s team. Sam would also be joining them, while Devon chose to go with Kendra, Giles, Xander and Cordelia. They started gathering their weapons, lots of stakes, crossbows for Cordelia and Soul, and swords and axes for the rest of them. While they were arming up, Angel stood out of the way and studied the sword Kendra had brought. Buffy went to join him after she’d collected her weapons of choice.</p>
<p>“You don’t want anything else?” Buffy asked, gesturing at the sword.</p>
<p>Angel shook his head. “I only have the one job.” He took his eyes off the magic sword for a second and looked at her. “Are you okay?”</p>
<p>Buffy scoffed. “Of course I’m okay. Why wouldn’t I be okay?”</p>
<p>“Our family could be trying to end the world,” Angel said.</p>
<p>There was that.</p>
<p>Oz ceded his van’s driver’s seat to Soul before they left. The idea was that there’d be less moving around once they got to the warehouse, which was a good idea but it didn’t take into account that Oz’s van was meant to seat five in a relatively small space, so Angel ended up in the back with the weapons. The first few times they turned corners, Buffy heard Angel colliding with the inside of the van.</p>
<p>Soul brought the van to a stop three buildings down from the warehouse that had been marked on the map. He turned around to look at Buffy. “Should I stay here or do you want me to park closer?”</p>
<p>Buffy eyed the distance between them and the warehouse they’d be breaking into. “Unless something comes through the radio, wait five minutes and then park right in front of the building.” Soul nodded.</p>
<p>Since there weren’t really any big risks to being noticed (they were going to have to fight vampires anyway), Buffy disregarded the stealthy approached and kicked the door in. It flew off its hinges and knocked one of the two vampires on the other side across the room. That vampire exploded into dust, probably due to a broken board sticking out of the wall. Its companion took one look at Buffy and started shouting that the Slayer was there.</p>
<p>“Always nice to be recognized,” Buffy muttered. She looked at Angel and said “Find the statue.” before throwing herself into the fight with the vampire and the three others who’d joined him. They were textbook minions, relying mostly on their strength and the few hand-to-hand combat moves that all vampires seemed to have as soon as they clawed their way out of their graves. Sam and Oz staked one of them while Willow levitated some broken wood and took out others that were coming to join the fight. Buffy danced through her three enemies and dust fell around her. In less than five minutes there wasn’t a vampire left in the area.</p>
<p>Willow frowned. “Is that all of them?”</p>
<p>“Don’t complain about that,” Sam said. He rubbed his shoulder and grimaced.</p>
<p>Willow blushed. “I’m not complaining, I just think that if Acathla was here there’d be more vampires guarding him.”</p>
<p>They were interrupted by Xander’s voice coming from the radio in Oz’s pocket. “It’s here! Acathla’s here! We’re under att—” Willow squeaked when Xander was cut off by a loud crash.</p>
<p>Angel appeared at Buffy’s side. “Let’s go.”</p>
<p>Soul already had the van started when they got outside. His face was pale. They piled into the van without putting their weapons away and Soul peeled down the street before the doors were all closed. Considering that Buffy almost got poked in the eye with Willow’s sword and Sam did take a hit to the chest from the blunt end of the stake Buffy was holding, it probably wasn’t their best idea. They all got organized eventually.</p>
<p>“What’s the plan, Buffy?” Willow asked.</p>
<p>Buffy took a few breaths to try to calm down. That didn’t stop her heart from hammering in her chest. “Angel kills the statue, the rest of us rescue our friends.”</p>
<p>“Good plan,” Sam said. “I like that plan, it means the world won’t end.”</p>
<p>Buffy hoped that he was right.</p>
<p>Crawford Street was silent when they got there, <em>dead </em>silent. It sent shivers up Buffy’s spine that she determinedly shook off. Not hearing the sounds of a fight was no reason to get the wiggens.</p>
<p>“Which house is it?” Soul whispered.</p>
<p>“The mansion at the end of the street,” Buffy whispered back. Because of course it was.</p>
<p>This time, Buffy entered the mansion through the front door and she felt a lot more confident about the people at her side actually having her back. The front door turned out to be the right choice because they walked right into the large room where Buffy had fought Angelus and immediately found the big, ugly petrified demon. It was standing in the middle of the room in front of the fireplace, grimacing at them, surrounded by vamp dust that covered the floor.</p>
<p>“Where is everyone?” Willow whispered.</p>
<p>Angel turned his head and then swallowed uncomfortably. “I hear heartbeats in the basement.” Of course they were in the basement.</p>
<p>“Split up?” Sam asked.</p>
<p>Buffy shook her head. “Angel?” She gestured towards the demon. Better to get that out of the way first.</p>
<p>Angel cautiously advanced on the demon, but the only other movement was from the vampire remains his steps disturbed. The thick layer of dust rose up in little swirls and puffs, revealing the pattern on the floor beneath. When Angel was a foot away from the statue he stopped and swung the sword. It cut through the statue like the stone was butter and the top half off the demon slid down the diagonal cut and crashed onto the floor before the statue started crumbling to dust. Easy. Too easy.</p>
<p>Buffy sensed Lucy’s presence a split second before she started speaking. They all turned towards the stairs when Lucy’s voice began drifting down. She was standing near the middle of the staircase, looming over them while she read from the book she was holding. It was Latin, which meant she had to be doing magic.</p>
<p>“What’s happening?” Buffy asked Willow.</p>
<p>Willow opened her mouth to reply, but before she could get a word out the floor started glowing. White light formed a circle and magical-looking symbols around a five-pointed star that Angel was standing in the centre of. A rippling black substance—not a liquid but not quite solid—appeared under Angel’s feet.</p>
<p>Angel fell through the floor and disappeared.</p>
<p>The lights vanished a second later, leaving Buffy blinking away spots. She didn’t need to be able to see properly to glare at Lucy, who was grinning broadly. “What did you do?”</p>
<p>Lucy made a visible effort to tone down her smile, and failed. “I sent him to hell, a hell. One that he could get out of, eventually.”</p>
<p>“Payback?” Oz asked.</p>
<p>“Exactly,” Lucy said.</p>
<p>Buffy hurled her stake. Lucy shrieked as the piece of wood scraped her shoulder and stuck into the wall behind her. “Get gone,” Buffy said. “You have until sunrise to leave town. After that it’s open season on the Aurelius bloodline.”</p>
<p>“We didn’t kill him!” Lucy exclaimed. “He’s even got a magic sword. Angel will be fine, tortured a little, but fine.”</p>
<p>Buffy growled and took a threatening step towards the staircase. Lucy squeaked. She disappeared upstairs before Buffy had to move any closer.</p>
<p>“What do we do now?” Willow asked quietly.</p>
<p>Buffy turned sharply on her heel. “Basement.” First they’d free their friends. Then they’d figure out how to bring Angel home.</p>
  </div></div>
<a name="section0027"><h2>27. Seventeen Forever</h2></a>
<div class="story"><div class="userstuff module">
    
    <p>
  <strong>
    <em>Lucy</em>
  </strong>
</p>
<p>The feeling of leaving the Hellmouth behind was something that Lucy would never forget. There was an absence of something she’d never not felt since she became a vampire, a gaping hole in her chest, a lack of electricity in the air that made her want to cry. She made a sound somewhere between a moan and a whimper.</p>
<p>“Alright, kitten?” Spike asked from the driver’s seat of the DeSoto.</p>
<p>“I’m empty,” Lucy said. “Is leaving a Hellmouth always like this?”</p>
<p>Spike shook his head. “No, it’s not. You’ll get used to it.” He looked over at Drusilla, who had fallen asleep curled up in the passenger seat as soon as beams of sunlight started peaking over the horizon. “You’re sure Dalton will manage?”</p>
<p>“He’s smart and loyal,” Lucy replied. There wasn’t anyone else they could trust to leave in charge while they were gone. They’d be back, of course. Sunnydale was theirs now. Buffy just needed some time to cool off.</p>
<p>Angel would be back too, eventually. Lucy and Dalton had carefully chosen the hell dimension they’d sent him to. There were semi-permanent portals between that hell dimension and Earth. All Angel had to do was find one. Sure, it could take him hundreds of years, but with the way time passed in the hell dimension it would only seem like a few months in Earth time. Once he was back, well, one great thing about being immortal was that they could torture Angel forever. Lucy had some ideas for next time.</p>
<p>Lucy yawned. The car windows were painted over to keep sunlight out, but she could still feel that it was nearing the end of the night and she should be getting ready to sleep. “Where are we going, Spike?”</p>
<p>Spike looked at her over his shoulder. “Where do you want to go?”</p>
<p>“New York.” Obviously. Lucy bit her lip. “And could we make a stop in Frisco? There’s someone there I want to kill.”</p>
<p>Spike smiled. “San Fran it is, kitten. How long do you think we’ll be there?”</p>
<p>Lucy thought for a moment. A smile tugged at the corners of her mouth. “We packed chains, didn’t we? And knives?”</p>
<p>“We could even scare up a branding iron, if that’s what you fancy.” Spike chuckled. “What have you got planned?”</p>
<p>“A little bit of torture,” Lucy said. “Will you teach me something new?”</p>
<p>“I’ll teach you everything I know,” Spike promised. “Get some sleep, luv. We’ve got a long way to go until nightfall.”</p>
<p>Lucy lay down on the back seat and closed her eyes. She dreamed of eternity.</p>
<hr/>
<p>To Be Continued</p>
  </div></div>
<a name="section0028"><h2>28. Deleted Scenes and Extras</h2></a>
<div class="story"><div class="userstuff module">
    
    <p>Because this is totally a DVD.</p>
<hr/><p>Deleted Scenes</p>
<hr/><p>From Chapter 12: Promises</p><p>
  <em>Lucy got a little too out of character (as a human anyway) for me to use this version of her threatening Jim after Devon beats him up. It was fun to write though.</em>
</p><p>She crouched down next to Jim, who was groaning quietly. He blinked a few times and his eyes focused on her face. His lips curled into a bloody snarl. “Bitch.”</p><p>Lucy smiled. “You’re gonna die.”</p><p>Jim’s mouth dropped open. “Are you...threatening me?”</p><p>“Stating a fact. Seeing as this is Sunnydale I’m betting you’ll be in the ground sooner rather than later, and when you are I promise you I’ll be around to spit on your grave.” Lucy’s smile grew wider as she leaned over to whisper in Jim’s ear. “Or I could ask our blond friend from last night to bleed you dry. Whatever works.”</p><p>Lucy stood up. “<em>That</em> was me threatening you.”</p>
<hr/><p>From Chapter 13: Visitors and the Dark Age</p><p><em>This little exchange was cut because a) I didn’t think that Joyce would be comfortable implying that her seventeen-year-old niece would have sex with a man she thinks is in his twenties and b) the way she’s talking is way too flippant and out of character for the topic</em>.   </p><p>Aunt Joy patted her shoulder. “Sometimes is better than never. And if William makes you happy, well, he may be a little too old for you but you’ll be an adult in a year and until then I think I can trust you to be responsible.”</p><p>Lucy gave a small smile. “Not break the law, you mean?”</p><p>“Exactly. William’s a nice young man who doesn’t need a criminal record.”</p><p>The irony of that statement was lost on Aunt Joy. Statutory rape would probably be just above robbery and jaywalking in terms of severity on William the Bloody’s very long rap sheet, if one actually existed.</p>
<hr/><p>From Chapter 24 (originally Chapter 23): Unchained</p><p>
  <em>I changed my mind about how Lucy was going to be turned into a vampire multiple times while writing this story. This section is from when I thought that Spike was going to sire her and take her back to the factory to wake up. And the line about Spike being real is because I had the idea that the First was going to be hanging around looking like Buffy and taunting Lucy while Angelus was torturing her, but I changed my mind about that too and decided it had better things to do than invest a lot of time in a minor player. </em>
</p><p>It took three days for Lucy to wake up. Spike had been with her the entire time. He’d laid her body on the bed in his and Dru’s room after he got back from the mansion and cleaned the dirt and dried blood off her skin. The physical wounds that Angelus had given her healed right before his eyes. Cut skin sealed, bruises faded, and even broken bones knit back together. Spike watched her heal and paced around the room. Drusilla had come downstairs the night after Lucy had been rescued to ask Spike if he’d like to go hunting with her. Spike had refused.</p><p>“I want to be here when she wakes up,” he’d said. “Like you were for me.”</p><p> “My sweet knight.” Drusilla had smiled and kissed him slowly. She wasn’t angry. “I’ll bring you a treat.”</p><p>Lucy’s eyes fluttered open a few hours after the sun set on the third day. Spike sat down next to her as she took a breath that she didn’t need.</p><p>“Spike?” Lucy reached up and touched his face. “You’re real. I can hear you.”</p><p>“I’m real.” Spike held her other hand. “How you feeling?”</p><p>Lucy slowly sat up. “I feel strong. I can hear everything. It’s all so...clear.” There was wonder in her voice. “Everything is clear.”</p><p>The kiss was a surprise. Lucy kissed him and Spike felt like electricity was running down his spine.</p><p>“Well,” Spike said when the kiss ended. “Why haven’t we done that before?”</p><p>“Drusilla.” Lucy trailed kisses along his jaw. “And me being all human and easily breakable.” She pressed her lips against the place on his neck where there would have been a pulse if his heart beat. “Funny how being dead changes your perspective on things.”</p><p>“Doesn’t it just?” Spike wrapped his arms around Lucy and held her close, keenly aware of the bare skin of her back and shoulders. He breathed in her scent. It was the same as it had been when she was alive, still sweet, still good, but her blood had cooled. There was the faintest, nearly undetectable chill that marked her out as a vampire.</p><p>Lucy sighed and drew back. “Drusilla and Dalton brought breakfast. I guess we’d better go join them.”</p><p>They didn’t have to, but Drusilla would certainly be happier if they did.</p><p>Lucy kissed him one more time. “To be continued. Help me find something to wear.”</p>
<hr/><p>From Chapter 27: Seventeen Forever</p><p>
  <em>I was going to kill off Drusilla at one point, and then I decided not to because it just didn’t fit. Here’s the start of the last chapter when Drusilla was dead.</em>
</p><p>The feeling of leaving the Hellmouth behind was something that Lucy would never forget. There was an absence of something she’d never not felt since she became a vampire, a gaping hole in her chest, a lack of electricity in the air that made her want to cry. She made a sound somewhere between a moan and a whimper.</p><p>“Alright, kitten?” Spike asked from the driver’s seat.</p><p>“I’m empty,” Lucy said. “Is leaving a Hellmouth always like this?”</p><p>Spike shook his head. “No, it’s not.” His voice was strained. He was hurting worse than her. Lucy would have known that even if she couldn’t hear the pain in his mind. Drusilla was gone. His sire, his one constant for more than a century. Leaving the Hellmouth was nothing compared to that.</p>
<hr/><p>Extras</p>
<hr/><p>A Family Thing</p><p>
  <em>These are a few interactions between Lucy and Angel in this story that happened off-screen. I’ve written them in chronological order and, for a change of pace, from Angel’s point-of-view.</em>
</p><p>Angel’s entire apartment smelled of human blood. It was a smell that Angel was extremely familiar with, seeing as he was a vampire. This blood, though, had an undertone that Angel knew very well. It didn’t bode well for Lucy, who’d only just woken up after having her blood taken by Drusilla.</p><p>“Buffy, could I talk to Lucy in private for a minute?” he asked when he entered the bedroom.</p><p>Buffy, the vampire Slayer and the girl Angel loved more than anything, looked from Angel to her cousin Lucy and back again. “Yeah, sure.”</p><p>Angel waited until he heard Buffy move away from the closed door before he spoke. “When did Drusilla give you her blood?”</p><p>“A few weeks ago.” Lucy slowly sat up on the bed and Angel helped her sip from the can of ginger ale he’d gotten her. “Can it go away?”</p><p>Angel assumed that “it” referred to the psychic link that Drusilla had forged between her and Lucy. He shook his head. “Not unless you...uh...”</p><p>“Die?” Lucy asked. “That’s what Spike said.”</p><p>Spike wasn’t wrong. Either Lucy or Drusilla would have to die to break the link. And if it was Drusilla who died it probably wouldn’t be good for Lucy.</p><p>Lucy’s hands shook as she tried to put the soda can down on the bedside table. Angel took it from her before it could spill and handed her a chocolate chip cookie. Lucy nibbled on it with very little enthusiasm.</p><p>“Am I still human?” Lucy asked.</p><p>“Yes,” Angel said at once. “You’re still human. You still have a soul.”</p><p>Lucy sighed. “There’s nothing about this in Mr. Giles’s books.”</p><p>Angel had to search his memory for his response. It didn’t happen often, but the Aurelius clan was an old bloodline and even with his distance from the Order, Angel had learned the right word for this situation. “It’s called <em>gratia</em>.”</p><p>“‘Thankful’?” Lucy translated the Latin with a frown.</p><p>“More like ‘favour’,” Angel said. “Drusilla...made you a vampire without making you a vampire.”</p><p>It was something that vampires did very rarely for humans they favoured but didn’t want to sire right away. The practice had died out over the centuries except in the more traditional families. Angel didn’t know exactly how it worked, but he did know that it was all about the blood. Wasn’t it always?</p><p>“Meaning?” Lucy asked.</p><p>“Meaning...” Angel sighed. “Welcome to the family.”</p><p>***</p><p>Being attacked by a member of his vampire family was something that Angel was used to. If he’d been without his soul he would have hit back. As it was, he was thankful that Lucy had pulled her punches enough that she only threw him into the wall instead of through it. He didn’t feel like fixing a person-sized hole in the wall. Or explaining to his neighbour why her apartment now had a window into his bedroom, when Lucy threw him to the other side of the room.</p><p>“Are you done?” Angel asked. He stayed crouched on the floor until Lucy nodded. It was easier to stay down when she started swinging at him. Playing dead made her demon get bored. It wasn’t like he couldn’t take a short beating, and he sure felt like he deserved it.</p><p>Lucy sat down on the edge of the bed and wrapped her arms around her torso like she was trying to hold herself together. “I want Spike.”</p><p>Angel had sent Spike away after Lucy had completed her transformation into a vampire. There had been yelling and a near brawl, but Angel stood firm. Spike was a bad influence. Angel wasn’t going to let him anywhere near Lucy while he was trying to teach her to not be a monster. She could be one of the good guys, he was sure of it.</p><p>Tears ran down Lucy’s cheeks. Angel sat down next to her. He was pleasantly surprised when she accepted his offer of comfort and let him hold her while she cried. If he’d tried that the week before she would have been sure to push him away.</p><p>“I’m such a mess.” Lucy dried her eyes on her sleeve. “Why don’t you give up on me?”</p><p>“I’m your sire,” Angel said. “And I’m your friend. I’ll never give up on you.”</p><p>Lucy rested her head on his shoulder. She probably didn’t realize that she was purring. “You’re a good friend.” She didn’t say anything more, and without cues from her breathing or heartbeat it took Angel a while to realize that she’d fallen asleep. Chuckling softly, he tucked her into bed and slipped out of the room.   </p><p>***</p><p>Angel and Lucy were having a staring contest when there was a knock on the door. Part of Angel—the demonic, Angelus part—wanted to make her back down and then punish her for daring to challenge his authority. He was grateful that answering the door gave him an excuse to avert his eyes first.</p><p>“Buffy, hi.” Angel stepped to the side to let Buffy in and saw that Lucy had moved from where they’d been standing in the middle of the room to flip through a book on the couch. “What’s up?”</p><p>“We’ve got a ghost problem,” Buffy said. “I was hoping you two would be able to help out with this spell Giles found.”</p><p>Angel didn’t have to look at Lucy to know that she was attempting puppy eyes. “What kind of spell?”</p><p>“An exorcism thingy,” Buffy said. “Totally safe, no blood involved.”</p><p>Angel did look at Lucy then. She’d been doing well. Really, there wasn’t any reason not to let her leave the apartment aside from an abundance of caution. If he was with her the whole time, if they went to help with the exorcism and came straight back home, it could be a good test outing. “Sure, we can help. At the library?”</p><p>Buffy nodded.</p><p>Lucy was so excited to go outside. Angel felt slightly guilty that he’d kept her cooped up for so long. She practically skipped through the streets as they made their way to Sunnydale High. When they got to the school, Angel made it halfway into the library before he realized that Lucy wasn’t right behind him. He turned around and saw her standing frozen in the middle of the hallway several feet away.</p><p> “Give us a second,” he told Buffy, Giles, Willow, Xander, and Jenny Calendar. He went back out into the hall. “What’s wrong?”</p><p>“I shouldn’t be here,” Lucy said in a small voice. “I’m a monster. They’ll hate me.”</p><p>The same thoughts had crossed Angel’s mind a time or a hundred. He told Lucy almost exactly what he’d learned to tell himself. “Then that’s their problem. You’re still you.”</p><p>Lucy squeezed her eyes shut.</p><p>“We won’t tell them, if you’re not ready,” Angel said.</p><p>“Okay,” Lucy said. She opened her eyes and met Angel’s gaze for a second before her gaze skittered off to the side. Whether she was trying not to get into a fight for dominance right outside the library or if it was a side effect of nervousness, Angel wasn’t entirely sure. He gave what he hoped was a reassuring smile.</p><p>“It’ll be fine,” he said.</p><p>Lucy nodded. Angel opened the door and she followed him into the library.</p>
<hr/><p>Nothing Gold Can Stay</p><p>
  <em>Everyone thank JayeMaru (from fanfiction.net) for this missing scene. Because Spike has a lot of feelings and while they’re waiting on Lucy to rise is a great time for mulling them over, even if this does have less mulling than I planned.</em>
</p><p>Lucy was dying when Spike found her. He’d seen the results of Angelus’s torture sessions many times before and he knew when a human was beyond saving, alive anyway.</p><p>The chains holding Lucy up were easy for Spike to rip out of the wall. He ignored the brief rain of dust from the broken stone and tried to lower Lucy to the ground without causing her too much more pain. She made a whining sound but otherwise didn’t react. Dried blood flaked off of her skin, joining the puddle of blood that had formed around her feet. Spike set her down on a patch of floor that was free of major bloodstains. Then he asked and she answered.</p><p>“Do you want me to let you die?”</p><p>“No. I’m not done yet.”</p><p>He cut his wrist open with his teeth and fed her as much of his blood as she could swallow. She wouldn’t be a minion. He’d give her more blood after she woke up to be sure.</p><p>“I’ll stay with you the whole time,” he said. “I’ll be there when you wake up, I promise.”</p><p>Then he heard Angelus scream. The faint smell of ozone filled the air for a moment. Magic, in all likelihood. That was confirmed when the Slayer and Angel came into the cellar. Angelus would never have conceded anything to Spike.</p><p>Despite Angelus living in the factory for more than a month, Angel’s apartment was still filled with his scent. Spike didn’t want to be there. He wanted to take Lucy back to Drusilla for Dru to fuss over. He wanted to wait for Lucy to wake up and take her on her first hunt. But he couldn’t because of Angel and the Slayer.</p><p>The Slayer locked Spike and Angel out of the washroom while she cleaned the blood off Lucy’s body and dressed her in something that wasn’t falling apart. Then there wasn’t anything to do but wait.</p><p>Wait, and glare at Angel when he was in the apartment. All of this was Angel’s fault. Spike had plenty of reasons to hate him.</p><p>But.</p><p>Spike wasn’t stupid. He knew that if she hadn’t been on the verge of dying from Angelus’s torture Lucy would never have agreed to be turned into a vampire. Angel was the only reason that Spike had a chance to keep her.</p><p>Wrestling with hate and anger and happiness kept Spike occupied and mostly distracted from worrying that Lucy wouldn’t want to stay with him. When the thought did intrude, he pushed it aside. Don’t think about that. Don’t think about how becoming a vampire changed people. Don’t think about how he tried to save his mother. Don’t think about the things his mother said before he staked her. <em>Don’t think about that</em>.</p><p>Hate Angel. Wait for Lucy to wake up.</p><p>Don’t think about <em>that</em>. </p>
<hr/><p>Vampires Only Sparkle in Dreams</p><p><em>This is the beginning of a </em>Twilight <em>crossover that I was going to write with Spike and Lucy in Forks taking place after “Lovers Walk”</em> <em>(Season 3, Episode 8), but I changed my mind. Maybe. I might use the idea for a Spuffy fic.   </em></p><p>The only reason that Lucy hadn’t knocked out Spike was that she was driving. There was only a small piece of the windshield that she could see through since the rest of it was painted and papered over to keep the sun out and if she took her eyes off of it for even a second she was likely to crash. Even vampires would have trouble getting out of a car crash unscathed, especially if the car caught fire. </p><p>“Spike, you’ve been complaining since you woke up,” Lucy said when Spike paused his tirade for a brief moment. “Why don’t you tell me how you really feel?”</p><p>She had her mind wide open for incoming thoughts directed at her, but sorting through Spike’s undirected mind was way too tiring to do so early in the night. He had a lot of thoughts. </p><p>Spike sighed. “Sorry pet, I just don’t understand why we’re helping the Slayer.”</p><p>“Maybe because we owe her for not killing us the last time we were in Sunnydale?” Lucy suggested. “And, you know, she’s family.”</p><p>Spike pointed at Lucy with the cigarette he was about to light. “Your family, not mine.”</p><p>“When you sire a girl, you join her family,” Lucy said, “but if it makes you feel better, it was Giles who asked. And no smoking while I’m driving.”</p><p>Spike grumbled but he put the cigarette away and started messing around with the radio instead. He found a rock station that they could both agree on and sang along to every song, making Lucy laugh when he made up all the lyrics he didn’t know.</p><p>They drove straight through the night, only pulling over for lunch so that they could have the usual fight over who got one of the rationed bags of O-negative blood without crashing the car. Spike thought that he had won, but Lucy pouted until he gave in and split with her. Maybe they would get lucky and run into a serial killer or someone else whose thoughts were painful for Lucy who had O-negative blood next time they stopped for a stretch.</p><p>The entire drive took two days. They had been in New York City when Giles had sent the email to the account Lucy had set up asking for her to call him. When she did he dumped a Watcher-typical account of demonic activity on her and asked if she and Spike could please go have a look at it because Sunnydale was in the process of going all to hell again and they really needed Buffy there.</p><p>A Watcher working with a vampire without a soul—a normal vampire—was something that just wasn’t done, but working with Buffy had turned Giles into a very not normal Watcher. He didn’t trust them, especially not after what had happened with Willow and Xander, but he would take the lesser of two evils if it came down to that. And if not lesser then at least more predictable.</p><p>Spike was driving when they entered the town. He took a brief look at the welcome sign before driving past it. Lucy didn’t have to read his mind to know that he would have run it over if it didn’t look like it would total the car. That didn’t matter. There would be plenty of other things for them to destroy in Forks.</p>
  </div><div class="fff_chapter_notes fff_foot_notes"><b>Notes for the Chapter:</b><blockquote class="userstuff">
          <p>And that's all, folks! I've written two out of twenty-seven chapters for the sequel to this story, which will probably be posted in like a year considering that it took me a little more than a year to write this one.</p><p>2021/04/15: So, the sequel is coming. It's just that stuff happened *looks at unexpected one-shots I've written over the past year* and I've only written four chapters. I'm working on it.</p>
        </blockquote></div></div>
</body>
</html>